Short answer
Mood is the patient’s own description of how they feel. Affect is the emotional expression the clinician observes.
Mental Status Exam Template
Copy this mental status exam template into your notes and fill in each line:
- Appearance: age appearance, dress, grooming/hygiene, distinguishing features
- Behavior: eye contact, cooperation, psychomotor activity (normal / agitated / slowed)
- Speech: rate, volume, tone, fluency, articulation
- Mood: in the patient’s words
- Affect: range (full / constricted / blunted / flat), stability, congruence with mood
- Thought process: linear and goal-directed / circumstantial / tangential / flight of ideas / loose associations
- Thought content: SI (plan, intent, means), HI, delusions, obsessions, preoccupations
- Perception: AH / VH / other hallucinations; responding to internal stimuli?
- Cognition: alertness, orientation (person, place, time, situation), attention, memory
- Insight: good / fair / poor
- Judgment: good / fair / poor (give an example)
USA Mental Status Exam: Quick Facts
- MSE type
- Observational, structured description
- MMSE max score
- 30 points
- Common MMSE cutoff
- ≤23 suggests impairment (adjust for education)
- MoCA normal
- 26+ out of 30
- Time (MMSE)
- About 10 minutes
- Used by
- Psychiatry, nursing, primary care, neurology
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