The Harvard Guide to Psychiatry: Third Edition - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 067437570X ISBN 13: 9780674375703

Publisher: Belknap Press, 1999

Synopsis

Four years in the making, this entirely revised edition of a classic text provides a lucid and erudite review of the state of psychiatry today. Since the publication of the last edition in 1988, remarkable advances have been made in laboratory and clinical psychiatric research; the fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV) has been published; managed care has radically altered the provision of all medical care; and the profession of psychiatry has come to a sophisticated new understanding of the interplay between psychiatric knowledge and issues in the larger society.

All these changes are reflected in the new text. Of particular interest are the masterful and lucid reviews of current knowledge in the neurobiology of mental disorders, in the section on brain and behavior. The section on psychopathology clarifies newly emerging diagnostic categories and offers new insight into addictions, anxiety disorders, and disorders of cognition.

Like its predecessors, The Harvard Guide To Psychiatry focuses throughout on the relationship between the physician and the patient. Its unspoken motto is that the art of psychiatry is as important as the science. For this recognition of what is relevant clinically as well as technically, this book will be an essential reference and support for both the new and the experienced psychiatrist.

This new edition includes up-to-date discussions of:

DSM-IV

Managed care

Improvements in neuroimaging

The increased use of psychoactive drugs

Recent advances in molecular biology

Research on the biology of schizophrenia, depression, anxiety, and addictive disorders

About this title

About the Author

Armand M. Nicholi, Jr., M.D., serves on the faculty of the Harvard Medical School and the staff of the Massachusetts General Hospital. His research has focused on late adolescence, and his investigation of college dropouts is the first large-scale epidemological study of that age group.

Review

The Harvard Guide to Psychiatry, now in a third edition, attempts something more challenging: to be 'a text...valuable to the other experienced clinician and researcher and sufficiently clear to be understood by the beginning student.' To a remarkable degree it succeeds. While probably best suited for a resident or an already trained clinician, much of the material is well within the interest level and grasp of motivated medical students. Only researchers, among the targeted readers, are likely to find it too basic and this only in their own field of expertise. Virtually every chapter presents a useful and well-referenced review of its topic circa the mid to late 1990s...Another criterion by which I judge a text is how helpful it is in writing examination questions for courses, in-training examinations, and certification tests. Here the Harvard Guide is quite useful...As a training director, I will not hesitate to add [it] to the other textbooks I recommend to students and residents as well as to colleagues preparing for their boards. (Journal of the American Medical Association)

Four years in the making and numbering 856 pages, this remarkable work is reader-friendly, explaining clinical terms with clarity and precision. Part medical text, part consumer guide, this reference is in a category all its own. Of particular interest is its attention to the all-important doctor-patient relationship...If you can't talk comfortably with your shrink--it's his problem, not yours; find someone else. (Picayune-Times)

Given the rate of progress in psychiatry and the brain sciences, a new edition of this readable, authoritative compendium is welcome just a decade after the second edition...This is a fine guide to an exciting and rewarding profession. Mental-health professionals will benefit from this book, as will lay readers who want to go beyond the general titles. (E. James Lieberman Library Journal)

This new edition of The Harvard Guide to Psychiatry continues the tradition of distinction established by its two predecessors...it is a skillfully selected, well-organized collection of 38 chapters that address the core topics of our profession...This third edition of The Harvard Guide ranks as the best of the three, all of which are very good indeed. It is my "desert isle" psychiatry guidebook. (John J. Schwab, M.D. American Journal of Psychiatry)

[Review of a previous edition]
This volume is first-class in all respects, from its conception through its content, format, and makeup. It is mercifully free of jargon; the papers breathe a comfortable air of authority. One can prophesy that the book will be a huge success because it has something for everybody--clinician, researcher, student, teacher, and anyone else interested in the psychiatric field. (American Journal of Psychiatry)

Edition details

• Publisher: Belknap Press
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 067437570X
• ISBN 13: 9780674375703
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 3
• Number of pages: 880
• Editor: Nicholi Jr. M.D. Armand M.