Advances in the standardization, precision and thoroughness of psychiatric diagnosis are being supplemented with attention to personalized or ideographic descriptive approaches. This promises not only to enhance the clinician's understanding of a case but to allow a fuller and more effective use of the evolving range of therapeutic possibilities. To reflect these developments, the Section on Classification, Diagnostic Assessment and Nomenclature of the World Psychiatric Association has prepared this volume which is organized around five prominent themes in contemporary psychiatric diagnosis: -major regional perspectives - ICD-10 - comprehensive diagnosis through the multiaxial model - treatment planning and organization of health services - the role and challenges of psychiatric diagnosis in primary health care.

This book presents an authoritative overview of the emerging field of person-centered psychiatry. This perspective, articulating science and humanism, arose within the World Psychiatric Association and aims to shift the focus of psychiatry from organ and disease to the whole person within their individual context. It is part of a broader person-centered perspective in medicine that is being advanced by the International College of Person-Centered Medicine through the annual Geneva Conferences held since 2008 in collaboration with the World Medical Association, the World Health Organization, the International Council of Nurses, the International Federation of Social Workers, and the International Alliance of Patients' Organizations, among 30 other international health institutions. In this book, experts in the field cover all aspects of person-centered psychiatry, the conceptual keystones of which include ethical commitment; a holistic approach; a relationship focus; cultural sensitivity; individualized care; establishment of common ground among clinicians, patients, and families for joint diagnostic understanding and shared clinical decision-making; people-centered organization of services; and person-centered health education and research.

The publication of the Cultural Formulation Outline in the DSM-IV represented a significant event in the history of standard diagnostic systems. It was the first systematic attempt at placing cultural and contextual factors as an integral component of the diagnostic process. The year was 1994 and its coming was ripe since the multicultural explosion due to migration, refugees and globalization impact on the ethnic composition of the U.S. population made it compelling to strive for culturally attuned psychiatric care. Understanding the limitations of a dry symptomatological approach in helping clinicians grasp the intricacies of the experience, presentation and course of mental illness, the NIMH Group on Culture and Diagnosis proposed to appraise, in close collaboration with the patient, the cultural framework of patients' identity, illness experience, contextual factors, and clinician-patient relationship, and to narrate this along the lines of five major domains. By articulating the patient's experience and the standard symptomatological description of a case, the clinician may be better able to arrive at a more useful understanding of the case for clinical care purposes. Furthermore, attending to the context of the illness and the person of the patient may additionally enhance understanding of the case and enrich the data base from which effective treatment can be planned.

"Doctors Mezzich and Hernandez have produced a comprehensive, progressive, and readable volume on a difficult and important topic. " Library Journal Drawing from its vast intellectual resources, the World Psychiatric Association established a multidisciplinary and international workgroup of scholars, clinicians, and researchers to develop the Educational Program on Sexual Health. The present volume, Psychiatry and Sexual Health: A Integrative Approach, is the result of this collaboration, and represents a new knowledge base for the discipline."

Advances in the standardization, precision and thoroughness of psychiatric diagnosis are being supplemented with attention to personalized or ideographic descriptive approaches. This promises not only to enhance the clinician's understanding of a case but to allow a fuller and more effective use of the evolving range of therapeutic possibilities. To reflect these developments, the Section on Classification, Diagnostic Assessment and Nomenclature of the World Psychiatric Association has prepared this volume which is organized around five prominent themes in contemporary psychiatric diagnosis: -major regional perspectives - ICD-10 - comprehensive diagnosis through the multiaxial model - treatment planning and organization of health services - the role and challenges of psychiatric diagnosis in primary health care.

This book presents an authoritative overview of the emerging field of person-centered psychiatry. This perspective, articulating science and humanism, arose within the World Psychiatric Association and aims to shift the focus of psychiatry from organ and disease to the whole person within their individual context. It is part of a broader person-centered perspective in medicine that is being advanced by the International College of Person-Centered Medicine through the annual Geneva Conferences held since 2008 in collaboration with the World Medical Association, the World Health Organization, the International Council of Nurses, the International Federation of Social Workers, and the International Alliance of Patients' Organizations, among 30 other international health institutions. In this book, experts in the field cover all aspects of person-centered psychiatry, the conceptual keystones of which include ethical commitment; a holistic approach; a relationship focus; cultural sensitivity; individualized care; establishment of common ground among clinicians, patients, and families for joint diagnostic understanding and shared clinical decision-making; people-centered organization of services; and person-centered health education and research.