Child And Adolescent Pyschopharmacology Made Simple - 2nd edition

Summary: In this age of managed care and soaring costs for even basic health services, the use of easy-to-prescribe medications to treat complex psychological problems in young people is ever more common. But the special extensive training in the use of these drugs, common to psychiatrists, is often not available to general practitioners. Poorly administered and loosely monitored treatment with psychoactive drugs can lead to even more serious problems in the children and adol ...show moreescents it strives to help.
New studies show that children and adolescents can react very differently to psychoactive medications than adults do. Therapists and parents often don't know what the range of these reactions can be.
The realities of contemporary psychological care make it increasingly more important for child and adolescent therapists and other helping professionals like school nurses-and even parents themselves-to be knowledgeable about this area of psychopharmacology. This short and easy-to-understand book offers anyone all the information he or she might need about the use of psychoactive medications in the treatment of childhood and adolescent psychological disorders.
Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology Made Simple, Second Edition, is organized by disorder and focuses on those problems most commonly encountered in young people-disorders like ADD, depression and bipolar disorder, anxiety, learning disorders, and psychotic disorders like schizophrenia and borderline personality disorder. Each chapter includes diagnosis criteria for each problem, treatment indications and contraindications, and notes for monitoring, evaluation, and follow-up care. The book identifies popular classes of drugs by brandand generic names, and provides fact sheets that therapists can offer to parents or that parents can show to those doctors who may need more information to make sound treatment decisions. This revised edition includes new research and medication information, updates to the section detailing the relationship between antidepressants and suicide risk, and new sidebars that explain each medication's side effects and signs of toxicity. ...show less