Spirituality and Psychiatry

Spirituality is a crucial but sometimes overlooked aspect of mental well-being and psychiatric care. This book explores the nature of spirituality, its relationship to religion, and the reasons for its importance in clinical practice. In this evidence-based text, the authors discuss the prevention and management of illness, as well as the maintenance of recovery. Different chapters focus on the key subspecialties of psychiatry, including psychotherapy, child and adolescent psychiatry, intellectual disability psychiatry, substance misuse psychiatry and old age psychiatry. It contains references to up-to-date research and provides a comprehensive review of the relevant academic literature. The book is, at least in part, a response to the questions posed by researchers, service users and clinicians, concerning the importance of spirituality in mental healthcare. Contributors include psychiatrists, psychotherapists, mental healthcare chaplains and a social worker. They discuss aspects of experience often omitted from psychiatry and present both clinician and service user perspectives. The book will be of wide interest to psychiatrists, psychiatry trainees and all mental health professionals.

About the editors

Chris Cook: Professorial Research Fellow, Department of Theology & Religion, Durham University, and Consultant in Substance Misuse, Tees, Esk & Wear Valleys NHS Foundation Trust.

Andrew Powell: formerly Consultant Psychotherapist and Senior Lecturer in Psychiatry, St George’s Hospital and University of London; and Consultant Psychotherapist and Honorary Senior Lecturer, the Warneford Hospital and University of Oxford.

Andrew Sims: former President of the Royal College of Psychiatrists and Emeritus Professor of Psychiatry, University of Leeds.

Each of the editors has in the past served as Chair of the Spirituality and Psychiatry Special Interest Group of the Royal College of Psychiatrists.

Quote from the editors: "Our guiding principle has been that spirituality in psychiatry, far from being an optional extra, is a necessary foundation for good clinical practice."