Working in an emergency department as a psychiatrist or mental health clinician requires an ability to gain a patient's rapport, establish a differential diagnosis, assess risk and make disposition decisions in a fast-paced and potentially chaotic setting. Patients may be medically ill, agitated, intoxicated, or suicidal, and resources for treatment may be difficult to access. A Case-Based Approach to Emergency Psychiatry provides the emergency department clinician with vivid and complex cases, discussed by psychiatrists who work daily in the emergency setting, that illustrate basic principles of assessment, diagnosis and treatment. These challenging and complex cases are based on the years of experience of the authors combined with current evidence-based practices and discussion. Risk assessment, psychosis, mood disorder, substance abuse, ethics, forensic issues, and personality disorders are discussed, along with child and adolescent, geriatric, and developmental disabilities. Special attention is also paid to alternatives to inpatient care, short-term crisis intervention, and the interface between medical and psychiatric illnesses. The case-based format allows the authors to link aspects of the clinical presentation to discussion and literature review in a memorable and compelling format.

"God Has it come to this?" Meet Grace, white-haired, with dementia, being admitted to the daunting asylum with an unwelcome introduction from the student nurse. Then Percy, the crystal radio buff, with depression. Here is Harry, the Japanese ex-POW, whose bath-time is a re-living of battles fought and Walter, with the dodgy and less than faithful, girl-friend. What about Tom, who is getting secret signs from both the Newscaster on the BBC as well as the landlady of the local pub, or Betty who won't fit in the coffin, and needs a bit of encouragement? But also meet Stuart, the very novice student nurse fearfully working on nights, standing there being strangled, not knowing what to do, or trying to come to grips on his first day on the ward with shaving a corpse. Learn about what goes on in the long asylum corridor & how to survive the laws of the asylum jungle. Stuart has to rely on information from the unlikeliest of sources, the Social Club hard drinkers. Asylum Bound is a wild weird walk through the experiences of a student nurse as he enters the unknown world of the mental "asylum" of the 1970s. It is a bizarre world, a world of terrible extremes. Within this odd place there are Hogarthian characters of varying chaotic hues, some aggressive, some sad, some disturbed and some institutionalised, both patients and staff. It is in this strange world that Stuart begins to understand the origins of psychiatry and its terrible treatments, including lobotomies, E.C.T., insulin shock and even aversion therapy for underwear snatchers. He has to learn about schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, new and frightening conditions that had new and frightening treatments and outcomes. But he finds an asylum coming to the end of any usefulness it might ever once have had. The patients are leaving, the staff are changing, and, thank God, the abuses are declining. It is a different world from anything he has experienced before. It is a very new world. It is a life-changing revelation. For Stuart, what started as a novelty, progressed to fascination and was to end in tragedy. It was the start of a long psychiatric nursing career. It is, sadly, all true.

"It has everything; familial hatreds, great love, romance and failed relationships, attempts by the character to change patterns of life -in fact all the ingredients of a page -turner. It is written in a highly charged poetic style and is full of fine imagistic writing and It should be published both because of all the above and because it is an individual experience which has universal significance. " - By Siobhan Campbell, Tutor on M A Creative Writing Course Kingston University

Description

Mad? Sad? Or Bad? the truth about Alzheimer's Disease. After a lifetime of coping with a very difficult - and sometimes nasty - mother, Patricia now faces her parents decline and impending death. As she guided her mother through family history, she tries to unravel what has always ailed the older woman.The story moves through darkness, to understanding and to skeletons in the cupboard. And ultimately to love.

But Patricia reaches a mind- blowing conclusion about what she believes to lie behind old age dementia.

About the Author

Pamela spent most of her working life bringing up four children and doing casual jobs.. she took a degree in English and at a local university and then taught in Adult Education and became a Market Research Interviewer. When her work dwindled in the Recession of the 1990s, she tried for a while to run her own private Adult Education business. She has always wanted to write and began in her twenties. She has broadcast her own talk on the radio, published some short stories and articles, and had prizes in a few writing competitions. Pamela lives in The Royal Borough of Kingston Upon Thames.

Book Extract

"'....And she's got a perfect figure, you know.' For the first time I am listening to what the nurse is saying about my eighty-eight year-old Mother.

'I like her, ' she had begun. What's all this? I asked myself. My mother's never got on with anybody, and probably nobody has ever liked her. She certainly doesn't like anyone much. We talk, as I scrabble around trying to remember how the conversation had started. 'She asked me where I came from. Tells me she has always wanted to travel...' Well, we all know that old story, don't we?

'...And she's got a perfect figure, you know.' That's when my ears pricked up. I'd hardly been listening, having looked after my mother for as long as I can remember, having lived her life rather than my own... But now this, at nearly ninety and last week nearly dead. 'What do you mean, what do you mean? In and out - in and out?'

'Oh - everything, ' the nurse laughs. 'And it is so good for you, because it's genetic.' Genetic? I am her, not exactly a case of symbiosis, since it has not been beneficial to me, but something like that.

A week ago, I stood over my mother, having been summoned to what I had thought was her deathbed. She was asleep, but gasping in her sleep, and I thought, 'Are you gasping to stay alive in the hope that one day you will have a life? No, what I really thought was, you look like I feel. Gasping to stay alive in the hope that one day you will have a life. And now this, the perfect figure? A young girl's body beneath that weary face? The tune 'Beautiful Dreamer' comes back into my mind. I think she even used to sing it, way far back, or at least hum it anyway.

Beautiful Dreamer, a Sleeping Beauty, is it really that? Is that old face weary with disappointment? Because the young girl's body has never been satisfied? Yet my mother has never shown any strong desires for such needs to be fulfilled. I am a Sleeping Beauty too, but I know it.

Manual Of Psychiatric Nursing Skills Guides Nursing Students And Practicing Nurses Towards Enhancing Fundamental Psychiatric Nursing Skills Competency In Specific Assessment And Interventions For The Selected Psychiatric Disorders. A Nursing Skill Book In A Manual Format, This Text Is Handy At The Clinical Site And Encourages Readers To Translate Their Theoretical Knowledge And Psychiatric Nursing Skills Into Clinical Practice. Topics Include Therapeutic Communication Techniques, Assessment And Interventions For Depression, Bipolar Disorder, Schizophrenia, And Suicide Attempts, And Crisis Management Skills For Psychiatric Emergencies. Included In The Appendices Are Essential Insights Into Ego Defense Mechanisms, Erickson'S Psychosocial Developmental Stages, Freud'S Stages Of Psychosexual Development, And Piaget'S Stages Of Cognitive Development.

Developed Especially For Practicing Nurses Preparing For The Certification Examination Offered By The American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC), The Psychiatric Nursing Certification Review Guide For The Generalist And Advanced Practice Psychiatric And Mental Health Nurse Provides A Succinct, Yet Comprehensive Review Of The Core Material. This Book Has Been Organized To Give The Reviewer Test Taking Strategies And Techniques And Sample Test Questions, Which Are Intended To Serve As An Introduction To The Testing Arena. In Addition, A Bibliography Is Included For Those Who Need A More In Depth Discussion Of The Subject Matter In Each Chapter. The Third Edition Has Been Completely Revised And Updated To Reflect Current Guidelines And Information From The Latest Version Of The DSM IV-TR. The Medications And Use Of Medications Has Also Been Updated To Reflect Proper Usage And Doses.

Book Description & About the Author

Trudy Marwick was born in South East London in 1965. She has spent most of her life living around London. Now living in Orkney and married to Malcolm and bringing up their children.

Her childhood spent trying to catch up with her brother and avoid bullying at school; she drifted into Teacher Training College but left after 2 years. She trained and worked in Personnel but now spends most of her time doing local voluntary work. Following years of research into Disability - particularly Autism and Aspergers syndrome Trudy could see some similarities between her childhood and that of her son.

Having been told at school that her stories lacked imagination, and were poorly put together, Trudy didn t feel confident about her writing. This is the first subject she has felt passionate enough about to overcome her fears of rejection and she wants her story to make a difference to others. Her insights into living with autism will be challenging and interesting to others who face diagnosis or who work alongside those with a diagnosis. Sometimes sharing the humour, sometimes the tears.

Researching her son s diagnosis of Autism spectrum disorder made Trudy face her own difficulties. She shares her journey of life s ups and downs living with autism.

Description

Rebecca describes her struggle with the depths of depression and the confusion of psychotic episodes vividly and honestly. This story has been written using diaries, which Rebecca has written every day since she was thirteen. This account is accompanied by evocative poetry, including poems written while she was experiencing psychotic illness.

She emerges at the end of the book with renewed confidence and clarity about her periods of illness. This book aims to show what it is like in the sufferer's mind and to give real hope to fellow sufferers that recovery is possible with help and support.

About the Author

Rebecca Morgan was born in Hertfordshire in 1951. She obtained a degree in Modern History and Politics from Sheffield University in 1973, followed by a Post-Graduate Diploma in Librarianship from Birmingham Polytechnic in 1975. In 1978 she became a Chartered Librarian and has worked for 20 years for Sheffield Libraries, Archives and Information Service.

She has experienced severe depression, postnatal depression and psychotic illness during her life.

Rebecca is married with one son and lives in Sheffield.

This is her first book, although she has had poetry and a few articles published in magazines and anthologies.

Rebecca Morgan is a pseudonym.

Substance abuse is a crisis of international concern. Substance Abuse Education in Nursing, Volume III expands upon the content in Volume II, and is particularly suited to the advanced baccalaureate level of ed ucation. Volume III offers nurse educators - as well as educators prep aring physicians, social workers, teachers, and counselors - the most current information on the recognition and treatment of this tragic di sease. As a comprehensive resource, educators will find this book indi spensable when updating existing curricula, developing learner objecti ves, and assessing educational outcomes.

Description

For twenty-eight years, I have been experiencing inner voices and physical presences in ways that would normally induce the label 'schizophrenic' - except that I have never been ill from this cause.

This is how it all began:

A 'presence' that I could not see, moved from the space in front of me, into me, and immediately my mind was charged with another 'voice' or provoker of thoughts, thoughts over which, then, I had no control, and which were not initiated by me. In my head began conversation as between two separate people, one of whom was me.
I began to hear voices.

This book is part autobiography, part DIY Manual, and so...

...if you are being engulfed in the quicksands of your mind, if you are calling for help in the silence of your mind, if you cannot silence the voices that invade your mind, dominate and torment you, if you are caring for someone who is struggling within the morass that their mind has become...

...if you are any of these, then I am writing for you.

About the Author

Born in South Wales, I spent my early years there, apart from four years service in the Royal Navy. In 1950, I graduated from the University of Wales with a degree in Electrical Engineering, and immediately began work at the Sellafield Nuclear Plant, where I spent all of my working life, my most memorable post being as Senior Instrument Engineer in the Calder Hall Nuclear Power Station.

I retired early, and began an entirely new life developing my smallholding, and my interest in horses. Quite by chance, and following a seemingly innocent investigation and an interest in dowsing, a situation developed from which I began to hear voices and experience a wide range of allied phenomena. That was in 1979, and to this day I have never been free from intrusions into my mind, or from intruding presences. YES - INTRUSIONS. Because of what I was doing at the time, and from all that has followed, I have not the smallest shadow of doubt that my experiences result from spiritual intrusion into my mind and body. I have never been ill from this cause, although there have been difficult times.

My purpose in writing is to inform and encourage - yes, to encourage those who are troubled by voices to believe that they can regain control of their minds and thoughts, and to help them to do so.

Geropsychiatric And Mental Health Nursing, Second Edition Addresses The Knowledge And Skills Necessary In The Assessment And Nursing Care Of Older Adults Experiencing Common Late Life Mental Health And Psychiatric Problems. This Text Features Experts In Gerontological Nursing And Geropsychiatric Fields And Provides Essential Information For Advanced Practice And Professional Nurses, As Well As Graduate And Undergraduate Nursing Students.The Second Edition Has Been Completely Revised And Updated To Include Crucial Areas Like Assessment, Diagnosis, Psychopharmacology, And Behavioral Management Strategies In Nursing Care Of Older Adults. New To This Edition Are Case Studies In Each Chapter In Addition To Discussion Questions. This New Edition Also Presents The Work Of The Geropsychiatric Nursing Collaborative (GPNC) In Its Entirety. The Focus Of The GPNC Is To Improve The Education Of Nurses Who Care For Elders Suffering From Depression, Dementia, And Other Mental Health Disorders. The Collaborative Effort Enhances Extant Competencies For All Levels Of Nursing Education, Focusing On Older Adults With Mental Health/Illness Concerns. Shared In The Appendix Are The Competency Statements Developed For Basic, Graduate, Post-Graduate, And Continuing Education Nursing Programs.

Decision-making involves a complex set of variables including cues and barriers to action that can trigger specific patterns of behavior. With respect to health and health care, the influences of gender, culture and trust may affect perceived health status and decision making preferences. In contemporary nursing practice, a great deal of emphasis has been placed on cultural competency as means of eliminating potential barriers to care. Cultural competency has become a prominent theme in nursing as a result. This study explores the influence of culture as well as that of gender in relation to decision-making preferences in health related behaviors. Specifically this study focuses on differences between Greek women and American women of Greek descent in the community of Tarpon Springs, Florida.