
“Solutions for Today’s Challenges in Advanced Practice Psychiatric Nursing”
Recorded October 9 and 16, 2021
7.25 ANCC-approved CE credits, including 5.5 toward pharmacotherapeutic CE requirements
Registration Fees
- $100 for AAPPN Clinical, Emeritus, and Out-of-State Members
- $50 for AAPPN Student Members
- $150 for nonmembers
Explore the full spectrum of treatment considerations and modalities that psychiatric nurse practitioners can utilize to enhance treatment outcomes.
Sessions will offer new research outcomes and evidence-based tools to support your practice. Topics include:
- Targeting the endocrine system for anxiety and mood disorders
- Ethno-Psychopharmacology
- Strategies to enhance charting
- Suicide and self-harm prevention
- ADHD throughout the lifetime
Targeting the Endocrine System to Optimize Treatment Outcomes for Anxiety, Fatigue, and Mood Disorders
Kristen Allott, ND, MS, LAc

Anxiety is more and more common, particularly as we rapidly move from isolation to connection.
This seminar will provide practitioners ways to assess, educate, and motivate their clients who may have little understanding of how the body affects the brain, moods, and behaviors. Learn how nutritional approaches to anxiety management can reduce the need for polypharmacy in anxiety treatment.
Tools are provided to support the body’s power supply through food, sleep, movement, and breathing, which greatly affect the stability of brain and moods. Dr. Allott will review common mental health complaints which may relate to low glucose/high adrenalin events and simple food tools that can help clients feel better within three days or even within minutes.
Kristen Allott, ND, MS, LAc, is a naturopathic physician, international speaker, author, and pioneering advocate for optimizing the brain and body.
Dr. Allott is an advocate for the use of whole foods nutrition to improve energy, mental clarity, decision making, and treatment of mental health and addiction disorders. She recently published a workbook with New Harbinger, Fuel Your Brain, Not Your Anxiety: Stop the Cycle of Worry, Fatigue, and Sugar Cravings with Simple Protein-Rich Foods.
Objectives
- Recognize possible low glucose/high adrenalin events such as:
- Anxiety: social, performance, generalized, OCD
- PTSD symptoms and nightmares
- Sleep disturbances: early morning waking, waking anxiety, nightmares, not hungry in the morning
- Fatigue and depression
- Suicidal ideation, cutting, cravings
- Describe the physiology of glucose, cortisol, and adrenalin and how they contribute to the above presentations.
- Identify how nutritional approaches to anxiety management can reduce need for polypharmacy in anxiety treatment.
- Apply simple food tools and receive handouts to offer patients food tools to feel better within minutes to three days.
- Identify what labs and lab values are important to order to rule out the physical cause of low glucose/ high adrenalin events.
Current trends and research in Ethno-Psychopharmacology
Rahn Kennedy Bailey, MD, DFAPA, ACP

Explore the latest research and significant historical perspectives in the field of Ethno-Psychopharmacology.
We will examine the importance of genetics—ethnicity and race—in the metabolic process of psychiatric medications and effectiveness in treatment. We’ll also review the Cytochrome enzymes CYP2D6, CYP3A4, CYP1A2, and CYP2C19, the metabolic pathways of most psychotropic drugs.
Dr. Bailey will also detail select relevant medication considerations in certain populations, including Asian patient populations, People of Anglo/European Descent, People of African Descent, Hispanic/Latin American populations, and Native Americans.
What does the future hold as practitioners work with patients of diverse populations? We will discuss the future of Ethno-Psychopharmacology, including new research considerations.
Rahn Kennedy Bailey, MD, DFAPA, ACP, is the Department Head for Psychiatry and Assistant Dean of Community Engagement at the LSU Health Science Center School of Medicine.
Dr. Bailey’s career has focused on treatment of the chronically mentally ill, forensic/violence assessments, and health disparities, working with underserved and minority populations in the U.S. and abroad. His publications include the books A Doctor’s Prescription for Healthcare Reform and At Gunpoint.
Objectives
- Understand the importance of genetics in the metabolic process of psychiatric medications and effectiveness.
- Detail the impact of the Cytochrome enzymes CYP2D6, CYP3A4, CYP1A2, and CYP2C19.
- Understand relevant medication considerations in Asian patient populations, People of Anglo/European Descent, People of African Descent, Hispanic/Latin American populations, and Native Americans.
- Apply current updates in the field of Ethno-psychopharmacology to their work.
- Understand the future of Ethno-Psychopharmacology through new research considerations.
Notes on Charting
Nikki Behner, DNP, MPH, ARNP

Charting is a crucial element to many facets of our work as Advanced Psychiatric Nurse Practitioners. Concise, accurate, and targeted charting is critical to our clinical work, and is vital in meeting third-party payer needs and managing our time.
Learn strategies and tips on charting gleaned from Dr. Behner’s 30-plus years in practice. This presentation will present an overview of charting in clinical patient records and will explore the things we may have never learned or considered when writing chart notes.
Consideration of the “who, what, when, where, and why” issues will be discussed with specific examples of potential errors when writing a clinical note.
Understanding of the deeper implications of the message, “If it isn’t charted, it didn’t happen,” will become clearer by the end of the presentation. The end goal is that your charting will be smarter, not harder.
Nikki Behner, DNP, MPH, ARNP, has more than 30 years of clinical experience in inpatient and outpatient acute mental health care settings.
Many of Dr. Behner’s clients are and have been involved in the legal system. As a result, she has had extensive contact with the legal system and been called to testify on multiple occasions. Given the breadth of her clinical experience, she has had the opportunity to learn first-hand the importance of thoughtful clinical documentation and has agreed to share some of the ‘pearls’ she has acquired to assist clinicians to evaluate and improve their documentation.
Objectives
- Identify three goals of documentation when completing clinical patient records.
- List three target audiences to consider when determining the content of clinical notes.
- Identify two types of information that should be avoided when documenting in an individual client’s record.
- Identify how to determine if my charting meets criteria for a specific CPT.
- Identify three ways that charting can reduce liability.
Taking a Comprehensive Public Health Approach to Suicide Prevention
Deborah Stone, ScD, MSW, MPH

Suicide and nonfatal self-harm are growing public health challenges across our nation.
Learn about trends in suicide and nonfatal suicide attempts in the population overall. Then take a deeper dive into trends among youth, including during the covid-19 pandemic.
We’ll also explore the potential contribution of PMHNPs in a comprehensive approach to suicide prevention.
Contributors to suicide among youth will be discussed along with CDC’s Comprehensive Public Health Approach to Suicide Prevention. This approach relies on multi-sectoral partnerships (e.g. healthcare, education, public health), uses data to identify populations disproportionately affected by suicide, and targets the factors that increase and decrease risk for suicide. It leverages current programs and practices in the community while bringing to bear prevention strategies with the best available evidence to fill the gaps.
Rigorous implementation and evaluation of the approach with a focus on continuous quality improvement and communication to stakeholders rounds out the approach.
Examples from CDC’s funded programs will be provided with time for questions and answers. You’ll also learn about resources for youth suicide prevention.
Deborah Stone, ScD, MSW, MPH, is a behavioral scientist and Team Lead for CDC’s Suicide Prevention Team within the Division of Injury Prevention (DIP) at CDC’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control.
Dr. Stone has worked in suicide prevention for over 20 years. She received a dual master’s degree in social work and public health from the University of Michigan and her doctorate in social and behavioral sciences from the Harvard School of Public Health.
Objectives
- Identify the general trends in suicide and nonfatal suicide attempts among youth and throughout the lifespan.
- List the multiple contributors to suicide.
- Articulate the potential contribution of PMHNPs to a comprehensive approach to suicide prevention.
ADHD Throughout the Lifetime: Diagnosis and Treatment
Christopher Varley, MD

Review criteria, consider presentation, discuss the diagnostic process, and review treatment in children, adolescents, and adults with ADHD.
Initially this disorder was understood to primarily affect elementary school age children, but research has established that this is a neurodevelopmental disorder which tends to present in early childhood and commonly persists not only into adolescence but into adulthood as well. It is associated with a number of adaptive problems throughout the lifespan.
We will examine the life course of ADHD and discuss best practice regarding making the diagnosis. A bio-psycho-social approach to treatment will be presented. Audience participation is encouraged and there will be ample time for questions. Please consider writing down questions prior to the presentation.
Christopher Varley, MD, is a board certified child and adolescent psychiatrist. He is a professor at the University of Washington School of Medicine (UWSOM) in the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. He has served on the UWSOM faculty for 43 years.
Dr. Varley has had a longstanding interest in ADHD and in promoting best practices in Pediatric Psychopharmacology. He has presented nationally and internationally in scientific meetings with over 200 presentations and also published extensively on these topics.
Objectives
- Identify appropriate rating scales to assist in diagnosis of ADHD.
- List the primary medications used to treat ADHD.
- Describe appropriate dose ranges and relevant side effects of medications.
- Identify psychosocial treatment measures which are effective for ADHD.
- Describe strategies that clinicians can use to manage potential of abuse of psychostimulants.
Contact hours
This nursing continuing professional development activity was approved by Oregon Nurses Association, an accredited approver by the American Nurses Credentialing Center’s Commission on Accreditation. Approval valid through 10/09/2023. OCEAN ID #2021-31.
Upon approval, attendees may earn 7.25 contact hours, of which 5.5 can be applied toward the pharmacotherapeutic continuing education requirement for advanced practice nurses with prescriptive authority. Participants must be present for or view all the educational activity to receive contact hours.