Author: Kirk D. Strosahl
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications
ISBN: 1608823474
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 327
Book Description
As a mental health professional, you know it’s a real challenge to help clients develop the psychological skills they need to live a vital life. This is especially true when you are working with time constraints or in settings where contacts with the client will be brief. Brief Interventions for Radical Change is a powerful resource for any clinician working with clients who are struggling with mental health, substance abuse, or life adjustment issues. If you are searching for a more focused therapeutic approach that requires fewer follow-up visits with clients, or if you are simply looking for a way to make the most of each session, this is your guide. In this book, you’ll find a ready-to-use collection of brief assessment and case-formulation tools, as well as many brief intervention strategies based in focused acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). These tools and strategies can be used to help your clients stop using unworkable behaviors, and instead engage in committed, values-based actions to change their lives for the better. The book includes a practical approach to understanding how clients get stuck, focusing questions to help clients redefine their problem, and tools to increase motivation for change. In addition, you will learn methods for rapidly constructing effective treatment plans and effective interventions for promoting acceptance, present-moment awareness, and contact with personal values. With this book, you will easily integrate important mindfulness, acceptance, and values-based therapeutic work in their interactions with clients suffering from depression, anxiety, or any other mental health problem.
Real Behavior Change in Primary Care
Author: Patricia Robinson
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications
ISBN: 1572248335
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 266
Book Description
As a primary care provider, you are on the front lines of medical treatment. Oftentimes, you're the first medical professional patients come to when they experience problems with their health. While some of these problems can be resolved by traditional medical treatment, many others are driven by underlying psychological issues and unhealthy lifestyle choices that you may feel powerless to affect. Between repeat patient visits and the frustrating progression of preventable symptoms and conditions, it's no wonder so many medical and behavioral health providers feel burned out and at a loss for effective solutions. This guide was designed to help you find those solutions and recapture the ability to effectively help patients achieve optimal health and happiness. Real Behavior Change in Primary Care offers ten-minute interventions that provide your patients with the tools they need to change unworkable and unhealthy behaviors. Each short yet powerful intervention utilizes empirically supported skills from acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), a form of cognitive behavioral therapy, to help you empower patients to take charge of the psychological blocks that keep them from resolving their health problems. You'll also apply ACT skills to your own life and learn to better manage stress, recover from burnout, and rediscover the meaning behind your work as a health care provider. Help patients suffering with: Chronic disease Alcohol and substance abuse Chronic pain Anxiety and depression Trauma and abuse
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications
ISBN: 1572248335
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 266
Book Description
As a primary care provider, you are on the front lines of medical treatment. Oftentimes, you're the first medical professional patients come to when they experience problems with their health. While some of these problems can be resolved by traditional medical treatment, many others are driven by underlying psychological issues and unhealthy lifestyle choices that you may feel powerless to affect. Between repeat patient visits and the frustrating progression of preventable symptoms and conditions, it's no wonder so many medical and behavioral health providers feel burned out and at a loss for effective solutions. This guide was designed to help you find those solutions and recapture the ability to effectively help patients achieve optimal health and happiness. Real Behavior Change in Primary Care offers ten-minute interventions that provide your patients with the tools they need to change unworkable and unhealthy behaviors. Each short yet powerful intervention utilizes empirically supported skills from acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), a form of cognitive behavioral therapy, to help you empower patients to take charge of the psychological blocks that keep them from resolving their health problems. You'll also apply ACT skills to your own life and learn to better manage stress, recover from burnout, and rediscover the meaning behind your work as a health care provider. Help patients suffering with: Chronic disease Alcohol and substance abuse Chronic pain Anxiety and depression Trauma and abuse
Inside This Moment
Author: Kirk D. Strosahl
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications
ISBN: 1626253269
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 376
Book Description
"A practical guide that presents a user-friendly approach to helping patients enact radical change and acceptance through mindfulness in their personal lives." —Family Medicine In this breakthrough book, cofounder of acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), Kirk Strosahl and two fellow ACT psychologists offer a brief, five-stage model to help you recognize, assess, and take advantage of the subtle shifts of awareness that occur during therapy to achieve the most effective intervention and successful treatment outcomes. In therapy, it is essential for both clinicians and their clients to pay attention to each moment in-session as an opportunity to create change. In addition, clients must be willing to experience pain in the present moment in order to make lasting change and begin to live according to their values. But staying in the moment is harder than it sounds. Inside This Moment offers a powerful skill set for learning to live in the now—even when it hurts. To help you and your client make the most of your time in treatment sessions, this book includes clinical examples of working with clients via self-related processes, and offers tips for what to do when faced with certain non-verbal and verbal client behaviors, such as: looking away or down body positioning respiration rate giving general answers to specific questions changing the topic forgetting what was asked repeating oneself over and over changes in rate of speech voice volume You'll learn that you don't need to go looking for radical change opportunities—but rather that the opportunities are transpiring right in front of you. This book will allow you to relax and trust in the power of the "now" in your therapy sessions.
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications
ISBN: 1626253269
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 376
Book Description
"A practical guide that presents a user-friendly approach to helping patients enact radical change and acceptance through mindfulness in their personal lives." —Family Medicine In this breakthrough book, cofounder of acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT), Kirk Strosahl and two fellow ACT psychologists offer a brief, five-stage model to help you recognize, assess, and take advantage of the subtle shifts of awareness that occur during therapy to achieve the most effective intervention and successful treatment outcomes. In therapy, it is essential for both clinicians and their clients to pay attention to each moment in-session as an opportunity to create change. In addition, clients must be willing to experience pain in the present moment in order to make lasting change and begin to live according to their values. But staying in the moment is harder than it sounds. Inside This Moment offers a powerful skill set for learning to live in the now—even when it hurts. To help you and your client make the most of your time in treatment sessions, this book includes clinical examples of working with clients via self-related processes, and offers tips for what to do when faced with certain non-verbal and verbal client behaviors, such as: looking away or down body positioning respiration rate giving general answers to specific questions changing the topic forgetting what was asked repeating oneself over and over changes in rate of speech voice volume You'll learn that you don't need to go looking for radical change opportunities—but rather that the opportunities are transpiring right in front of you. This book will allow you to relax and trust in the power of the "now" in your therapy sessions.
The Mindfulness and Acceptance Workbook for Depression
Author: Kirk D. Strosahl
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
ISBN: 1459611373
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 582
Book Description
There are hundreds of books that will try to help you ''overcome'' or ''put an end to'' depression. But what if you could use your depression to change your life for the better? Your symptoms may be signals that something in your life needs to change. Learning to understand and interpret these signals is much more important than ignoring or avoiding them - approaches that only make the situation worse. This workbook uses techniques from acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) to offer a new treatment plan for depression that will help you live a productive life by accepting your feelings instead of fruitlessly trying to avoid them. The Mindfulness & Acceptance Workbook for Depression will show you, step-by-step, how to stop this cycle, feel more energized, and involve yourself in pleasurable and fulfilling activities that will help you work through, rather than avoid, aspects of your life that are depressing you. Use the techniques in this book to evaluate your own depression and create a personalized treatment plan. You'll enrich your total life experience by focusing your energy not on fighting depression, but on living the life you want.
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
ISBN: 1459611373
Category : Health & Fitness
Languages : en
Pages : 582
Book Description
There are hundreds of books that will try to help you ''overcome'' or ''put an end to'' depression. But what if you could use your depression to change your life for the better? Your symptoms may be signals that something in your life needs to change. Learning to understand and interpret these signals is much more important than ignoring or avoiding them - approaches that only make the situation worse. This workbook uses techniques from acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) to offer a new treatment plan for depression that will help you live a productive life by accepting your feelings instead of fruitlessly trying to avoid them. The Mindfulness & Acceptance Workbook for Depression will show you, step-by-step, how to stop this cycle, feel more energized, and involve yourself in pleasurable and fulfilling activities that will help you work through, rather than avoid, aspects of your life that are depressing you. Use the techniques in this book to evaluate your own depression and create a personalized treatment plan. You'll enrich your total life experience by focusing your energy not on fighting depression, but on living the life you want.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Interpersonal Problems
Author: Matthew McKay
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications
ISBN: 1608822915
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 232
Book Description
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Interpersonal Problems presents a complete treatment protocol for therapists working with clients who repeatedly fall into unhealthy patterns in their relationships with friends, family members, coworkers, and romantic partners. These clients may blame others, withdraw when feeling threatened, react defensively in conflicts, or have a deep-seated sense of distrust—all interpersonal problems that damage relationships and cause enormous suffering. This book presents an acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) approach—utilizing a schema-based formulation—to help these clients overcome maladaptive interpersonal behavior. First, clients learn how schema avoidance behavior damages their relationships. Second, clients face “creative hopelessness” and practice new mindfulness skills. Third, clients examine what they value in their relationships and what they hope to gain from them, and translate their values into clear intentions for acting differently in the future. And lastly, clients face the cognitive and emotional barriers standing between them and values-based behavior in their relationships. By learning to act on their values instead of falling into schema-influenced patterns, clients can eventually overcome the interpersonal problems that hold them back.
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications
ISBN: 1608822915
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 232
Book Description
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Interpersonal Problems presents a complete treatment protocol for therapists working with clients who repeatedly fall into unhealthy patterns in their relationships with friends, family members, coworkers, and romantic partners. These clients may blame others, withdraw when feeling threatened, react defensively in conflicts, or have a deep-seated sense of distrust—all interpersonal problems that damage relationships and cause enormous suffering. This book presents an acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) approach—utilizing a schema-based formulation—to help these clients overcome maladaptive interpersonal behavior. First, clients learn how schema avoidance behavior damages their relationships. Second, clients face “creative hopelessness” and practice new mindfulness skills. Third, clients examine what they value in their relationships and what they hope to gain from them, and translate their values into clear intentions for acting differently in the future. And lastly, clients face the cognitive and emotional barriers standing between them and values-based behavior in their relationships. By learning to act on their values instead of falling into schema-influenced patterns, clients can eventually overcome the interpersonal problems that hold them back.
Ultra-Brief Cognitive Behavioral Interventions
Author: Len Sperry
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351202456
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 277
Book Description
Ultra-Brief Cognitive Behavioral Interventions showcases a new practice model to address both physical and psychological health issues in mental health and integrated care settings, utilizing focused interventions in brief treatment formats. This unique text offers a toolkit of effective interventions and methods – including cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) methods that can be used in a very brief time frame of 10–20 minutes – that can be quickly and efficiently applied to ameliorate specific symptoms. The 20 most common interventions in short-term therapy practiced in mental health and integrated care settings are illustrated in session transcriptions of the full course of focused therapy, with common presentations such as depression, anxiety and acute distress, pain, sleep problems, and weight problems. This book prepares emerging and experienced counselors and therapists to provide short-term therapy for their clients and equips them with the necessary skills to meet the challenges facing mental health care today and in the future.
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351202456
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 277
Book Description
Ultra-Brief Cognitive Behavioral Interventions showcases a new practice model to address both physical and psychological health issues in mental health and integrated care settings, utilizing focused interventions in brief treatment formats. This unique text offers a toolkit of effective interventions and methods – including cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) methods that can be used in a very brief time frame of 10–20 minutes – that can be quickly and efficiently applied to ameliorate specific symptoms. The 20 most common interventions in short-term therapy practiced in mental health and integrated care settings are illustrated in session transcriptions of the full course of focused therapy, with common presentations such as depression, anxiety and acute distress, pain, sleep problems, and weight problems. This book prepares emerging and experienced counselors and therapists to provide short-term therapy for their clients and equips them with the necessary skills to meet the challenges facing mental health care today and in the future.
Basics of Behavior Change in Primary Care
Author: Patricia J. Robinson
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030320502
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 172
Book Description
Emerging policy changes are encouraging adoption of a team-based approach to healthcare, yet most healthcare professionals receive little training in how to practice integrated care. Basics of Behavioral Health in Primary Care is a playbook for mental health and medical professionals to share in addressing behavioral health concerns in primary care. Concise and practical, this clinically-focused book addresses the needs of a diverse group of healthcare providers, as well as students preparing for careers in the rapidly changing landscape of healthcare.
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030320502
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 172
Book Description
Emerging policy changes are encouraging adoption of a team-based approach to healthcare, yet most healthcare professionals receive little training in how to practice integrated care. Basics of Behavioral Health in Primary Care is a playbook for mental health and medical professionals to share in addressing behavioral health concerns in primary care. Concise and practical, this clinically-focused book addresses the needs of a diverse group of healthcare providers, as well as students preparing for careers in the rapidly changing landscape of healthcare.
Radically Open Dialectical Behavior Therapy
Author: Thomas R. Lynch
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications
ISBN: 1626259305
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 408
Book Description
Based on over twenty years of research, radically open dialectical behavior therapy (RO DBT) is a breakthrough, transdiagnostic approach for helping people suffering from extremely difficult-to-treat emotional overcontrol (OC) disorders, such as anorexia nervosa, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and treatment-resistant depression. Written by the founder of RO DBT, Thomas Lynch, this comprehensive volume outlines the core theories of RO DBT, and provides a framework for implementing RO DBT in individual therapy. While traditional dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT) has shown tremendous success in treating people with emotion dysregulation, there have been few resources available for treating those with overcontrol disorders. OC has been linked to social isolation, aloof and distant relationships, cognitive rigidity, risk aversion, a strong need for structure, inhibited emotional expression, and hyper-perfectionism. And yet—perhaps due to the high value our society places on the capacity to delay gratification and inhibit public displays of destructive emotions and impulses—problems linked with OC have received little attention or been misunderstood. Indeed, people with OC are often considered highly successful by others, even as they suffer silently and alone. RO DBT is based on the premise that psychological well-being involves the confluence of three factors: receptivity, flexibility, and social-connectedness. RO DBT addresses each of these important factors, and is the first treatment in the world to prioritize social-signaling as the primary mechanism of change based on a transdiagnostic, neuroregulatory model linking the communicative function of human emotions to the establishment of social connectedness and well-being. As such, RO DBT is an invaluable resource for treating an array of disorders that center around overcontrol and a lack of social connectedness—such as anorexia nervosa, chronic depression, postpartum depression, treatment-resistant anxiety disorders, autism spectrum disorders, as well as personality disorders such as avoidant, dependent, obsessive-compulsive, and paranoid personality disorder. Written for mental health professionals, professors, or simply those interested in behavioral health, this seminal book—along with its companion, The Skills Training Manual for Radically Open Dialectical Behavior Therapy (available separately)—provides everything you need to understand and implement this exciting new treatment in individual therapy—including theory, history, research, ongoing studies, clinical examples, and future directions.
Publisher: New Harbinger Publications
ISBN: 1626259305
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 408
Book Description
Based on over twenty years of research, radically open dialectical behavior therapy (RO DBT) is a breakthrough, transdiagnostic approach for helping people suffering from extremely difficult-to-treat emotional overcontrol (OC) disorders, such as anorexia nervosa, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), and treatment-resistant depression. Written by the founder of RO DBT, Thomas Lynch, this comprehensive volume outlines the core theories of RO DBT, and provides a framework for implementing RO DBT in individual therapy. While traditional dialectical behavioral therapy (DBT) has shown tremendous success in treating people with emotion dysregulation, there have been few resources available for treating those with overcontrol disorders. OC has been linked to social isolation, aloof and distant relationships, cognitive rigidity, risk aversion, a strong need for structure, inhibited emotional expression, and hyper-perfectionism. And yet—perhaps due to the high value our society places on the capacity to delay gratification and inhibit public displays of destructive emotions and impulses—problems linked with OC have received little attention or been misunderstood. Indeed, people with OC are often considered highly successful by others, even as they suffer silently and alone. RO DBT is based on the premise that psychological well-being involves the confluence of three factors: receptivity, flexibility, and social-connectedness. RO DBT addresses each of these important factors, and is the first treatment in the world to prioritize social-signaling as the primary mechanism of change based on a transdiagnostic, neuroregulatory model linking the communicative function of human emotions to the establishment of social connectedness and well-being. As such, RO DBT is an invaluable resource for treating an array of disorders that center around overcontrol and a lack of social connectedness—such as anorexia nervosa, chronic depression, postpartum depression, treatment-resistant anxiety disorders, autism spectrum disorders, as well as personality disorders such as avoidant, dependent, obsessive-compulsive, and paranoid personality disorder. Written for mental health professionals, professors, or simply those interested in behavioral health, this seminal book—along with its companion, The Skills Training Manual for Radically Open Dialectical Behavior Therapy (available separately)—provides everything you need to understand and implement this exciting new treatment in individual therapy—including theory, history, research, ongoing studies, clinical examples, and future directions.
Cognitive Behaviour Therapy
Author: Frank Wills
Publisher: SAGE
ISBN: 1446289796
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 354
Book Description
′A delightful volume, with unique style and content. This new edition amply lives up to the authors′ aim of demonstrating a mode of CBT practice that incorporates many exciting developments whilst retaining the reassuring strength of the original parsimonious model.′ Ann Hackmann, Oxford Mindfulness Centre, University of Oxford ′One of the very best introductions to CBT, now enhanced with excellent coverage of new developments.′ Professor Neil Frude, Consultant Clinical Psychologist ′My first choice recommendation for trainee therapists. This outstanding and easy-to-read introduction just got better.′ Peter Simpson, Senior Lecturer in Mental Health, University of Glamorgan In their established guide to contemporary CBT theory and practice, the authors show how therapeutic change takes place across a network of cognitive, emotional and behavioural functioning. They explain the central concepts of CBT and illustrate - with numerous case examples - how these can effectively be put into practice at each stage of the therapeutic process. They also explain how the essence of cutting edge ′third wave′ can be integrated into everyday clinical practice. With two new chapters on mindfulness and increasing access to CBT, a wider coverage of client issues, extra case studies and learning resources, and a discussion of recent developments, this book continues to be the ideal companion for those working - or training to work - in the psychological therapies and mental health. Frank Wills is an independent Cognitive Psychotherapist in Bristol and tutor at the University of Wales Newport. Diana Sanders, Counselling Psychologist and BABCP Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist in Independent Practice, Oxford.
Publisher: SAGE
ISBN: 1446289796
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 354
Book Description
′A delightful volume, with unique style and content. This new edition amply lives up to the authors′ aim of demonstrating a mode of CBT practice that incorporates many exciting developments whilst retaining the reassuring strength of the original parsimonious model.′ Ann Hackmann, Oxford Mindfulness Centre, University of Oxford ′One of the very best introductions to CBT, now enhanced with excellent coverage of new developments.′ Professor Neil Frude, Consultant Clinical Psychologist ′My first choice recommendation for trainee therapists. This outstanding and easy-to-read introduction just got better.′ Peter Simpson, Senior Lecturer in Mental Health, University of Glamorgan In their established guide to contemporary CBT theory and practice, the authors show how therapeutic change takes place across a network of cognitive, emotional and behavioural functioning. They explain the central concepts of CBT and illustrate - with numerous case examples - how these can effectively be put into practice at each stage of the therapeutic process. They also explain how the essence of cutting edge ′third wave′ can be integrated into everyday clinical practice. With two new chapters on mindfulness and increasing access to CBT, a wider coverage of client issues, extra case studies and learning resources, and a discussion of recent developments, this book continues to be the ideal companion for those working - or training to work - in the psychological therapies and mental health. Frank Wills is an independent Cognitive Psychotherapist in Bristol and tutor at the University of Wales Newport. Diana Sanders, Counselling Psychologist and BABCP Accredited Cognitive Psychotherapist in Independent Practice, Oxford.
Clinical Manual for Assessment and Treatment of Suicidal Patients
Author: John A. Chiles
Publisher: American Psychiatric Pub
ISBN: 1615372024
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 392
Book Description
Since the first edition of Clinical Manual for Assessment and Treatment of Suicidal Patients was published in 2005, advances have been made that increase our understanding of suicidal and self-destructive behavior. Although clinicians cannot unerringly predict which patients will die by suicide, they can focus more successfully on early identification of suicidal behavior and effective intervention, and this new edition of the clinical manual thoroughly explores not only assessment of suicidality but what comes after an at-risk patient has been identified. The authors argue that treating specific psychiatric disorders is not enough to prevent suicide, and they offer clinicians the necessary information and strategies to bridge that gap. The authors' main premise is that suicide is a dangerous and short-term problem-solving behavior designed to regulate or eliminate intense emotional pain -- a quick fix where a long-term effective solution is needed -- and this understanding is the underpinning of the assessment and treatment strategies the authors recommend. The content of this new edition has been thoroughly reviewed and revised, and substantive changes have been made to specific chapters to ensure that the book represents the most current thinking and research, while retaining the strengths of the previous edition. The chapter on assessment has been revised to put the fundamental components of effective treatment in a clinical, case-oriented context and includes an easy-to-use assessment protocol that allows clinicians to determine where individual patients stand on seven dimensions (cognitive rigidity, problem-solving deficits, heightened mental pain, emotionally avoidant coping style, interpersonal deficits, self-control deficits, and environmental stress and social support deficits). The many issues involved in the use of psychotropic medications in suicidal patients are addressed in a new chapter, which includes information on the relevant classes of drugs (such as antidepressants and antianxiety agents) and the issues that may arise with their use, including side effects, degree of lethality, and tendency to aggravate suicidality on introduction and withdrawal of the medication. The chapter on special populations has been expanded to include adolescents, elders, and patients with co-occurring substance abuse or psychosis. Because of additional vulnerabilities, treating these groups may call for the use of added or special techniques to ensure the best therapeutic outcomes. Primary care physicians are the first point of contact for many patients, and they may require additional preparation in order to assess and respond to those experiencing suicidal thoughts. The chapter "Suicidal Patients in Primary Care" explores strategies for screening, recognizing, and assessing risk; treating the initial crisis; and developing a crisis management plan. "Tips for Success" appear at intervals, and "The Essentials" are included at the end of each chapter, highlighting the most important concepts. In addition, there are scores of helpful charts and exercises. Practical, accessible, and reader-friendly, the Clinical Manual for Assessment and Treatment of Suicidal Patients is not an academic book but rather is one designed to become an indispensable part of clinicians' working libraries.
Publisher: American Psychiatric Pub
ISBN: 1615372024
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 392
Book Description
Since the first edition of Clinical Manual for Assessment and Treatment of Suicidal Patients was published in 2005, advances have been made that increase our understanding of suicidal and self-destructive behavior. Although clinicians cannot unerringly predict which patients will die by suicide, they can focus more successfully on early identification of suicidal behavior and effective intervention, and this new edition of the clinical manual thoroughly explores not only assessment of suicidality but what comes after an at-risk patient has been identified. The authors argue that treating specific psychiatric disorders is not enough to prevent suicide, and they offer clinicians the necessary information and strategies to bridge that gap. The authors' main premise is that suicide is a dangerous and short-term problem-solving behavior designed to regulate or eliminate intense emotional pain -- a quick fix where a long-term effective solution is needed -- and this understanding is the underpinning of the assessment and treatment strategies the authors recommend. The content of this new edition has been thoroughly reviewed and revised, and substantive changes have been made to specific chapters to ensure that the book represents the most current thinking and research, while retaining the strengths of the previous edition. The chapter on assessment has been revised to put the fundamental components of effective treatment in a clinical, case-oriented context and includes an easy-to-use assessment protocol that allows clinicians to determine where individual patients stand on seven dimensions (cognitive rigidity, problem-solving deficits, heightened mental pain, emotionally avoidant coping style, interpersonal deficits, self-control deficits, and environmental stress and social support deficits). The many issues involved in the use of psychotropic medications in suicidal patients are addressed in a new chapter, which includes information on the relevant classes of drugs (such as antidepressants and antianxiety agents) and the issues that may arise with their use, including side effects, degree of lethality, and tendency to aggravate suicidality on introduction and withdrawal of the medication. The chapter on special populations has been expanded to include adolescents, elders, and patients with co-occurring substance abuse or psychosis. Because of additional vulnerabilities, treating these groups may call for the use of added or special techniques to ensure the best therapeutic outcomes. Primary care physicians are the first point of contact for many patients, and they may require additional preparation in order to assess and respond to those experiencing suicidal thoughts. The chapter "Suicidal Patients in Primary Care" explores strategies for screening, recognizing, and assessing risk; treating the initial crisis; and developing a crisis management plan. "Tips for Success" appear at intervals, and "The Essentials" are included at the end of each chapter, highlighting the most important concepts. In addition, there are scores of helpful charts and exercises. Practical, accessible, and reader-friendly, the Clinical Manual for Assessment and Treatment of Suicidal Patients is not an academic book but rather is one designed to become an indispensable part of clinicians' working libraries.