Helping Families With Special Problems

Therapeutic approaches for the treatment of families with members who suffer with significant emotional and behavioral disturbances have been developing rapidly. This volume makes available to both individual and family therapists the most effective clinical techniques for helping families with members exhibiting such problems as schizophrenia, acting out, depression, hysteria, phobia, personality disorder, childish behavior, learning disorder, drug abuse, psychosomatic illness, sexual dysfunction, physical disability, disease, and terminal illness; and for helping the divorcing, divorced, or remarried family. Each contributor considers the relevant knowledge concerning pathogenic mechanisms and pathological characteristics of one or more family types and describes the different family therapy approaches used to treat them.

School attendance problems, even in mild forms, are a significant risk factor for social, behavioral, and academic problems in childhood and adolescence. These cases tend to be urgent and complex in nature, with problems that manifest both at home and at school. As such, mental health and school-based professionals need practical and efficient strategies to resolve school attendance problems. Helping Families of Youth with School Attendance Problems is a real-world guide to addressing school attendance problems at different levels of severity and complexity. The book offers specific procedures for many types of cases to address these problems in a relatively short period of time, and within the constraints of most private practice and school settings. The text also considers developmental level, with distinct coverage of elementary school children as well as adolescents in middle school and in high school. The book consists of seven empirically-supported chapters that guide readers through assessment, consultation, and intervention processes. Given the limited timeframe frequently faced by mental health and school-based professionals, these processes are often blended. Beginning with an overview of school attendance problems, the heart of the book offers core intervention components as well as other procedures to enhance the effectiveness of these components. These components cover key aspects of anxiety and contingency management, school reintegration, and school engagement as well as suggestions for many specific scenarios. The final chapter focuses on chronic and severe school attendance problems and other highly challenging scenarios common to these young people. Helping Families of Youth with School Attendance Problems is a must-have resource for mental health and school-based professionals alike, as well as for others who regularly engage with this population.

In ‘Helping Families with Troubled Children’ Carole Sutton stresses the importance of attempting to work with families before difficult behaviour becomes entrenched and resistant to intervention, preferably at or before the age of 2 years. Drawing on social learning theory and cognitive behavioural principles, she provides a structured approach to intervention (ASPIRE -Assessment, planning, implementation, review and evaluation) and guides practitioners to work supportively with parents. Updated with the latest research findings in a number of areas of children’s difficulties, specific chapters address sleep problems, anxiety and depression, eating problems, wetting and soiling, serious behaviour problems and ADHD.

This book highlights encouraging news about programs that produce better outcomes for disadvantaged children and families. It includes a comprehensive and up-to-date synthesis of the research evidence available on the effectiveness of these promising programs. Particular attention is given to programs with a demonstrated potential to prevent child abuse and neglect and family breakdown.

A growing body of evidence supports the cost-effective contention that parents can be trained to participate in resolving their children's behavior problems by applying individualized techniques based on learning principles.

Helping Parents Help Their Kids is a guide both for clinicians who help families and for parents who have children with behavior problems. The author provides three ways to address clinical issues in designing and implementing child behavior management plans: a general behavioral consultation model, a specific behavioral model, and an empirically-tested advice package for problems that can occur in different family contexts. Each chapter provides early research on a specific strategy and several forms to use in the clinical environment.Parents will find this book helpful because the information is presented in a user-friendly format. The author explains how parents can learn specific strategies to deal with six common problems. These problems include: teaching both children and adolescents to comply with the rules of the house, dealing with disruptive behavior, and addressing problems in school.Helping Parents Help Their Kids offers both clinicians and parents effective procedures without the technical jargon many typical behavioral texts use. Instead, the author explains these methods in common-sense terms that will be a welcome change for all who want to find solutions for their child's behavioral problems.

Understanding the perspective of carers is an essential aspect of nursing. Supporting Families and Carers: A Nursing Perspective offers insights into the fundamental principles of caring for families and carers irrespective of age, gender, ethnicity, sexuality or religion. This book discusses the concepts and theories that underpin our understanding of the behaviours and feelings that families and caregivers may experience. While the book covers theoretical dimensions to understand the caregiving experience, it also provides practical perspectives for nursing and is a unique resource to inform nursing practice and learning at all levels. The book covers topics such as the stress process, stressors and how they relate to caregiving as well as actions and resources to help alter stressful situations. Interventions discussed include training and education programs, problem-solving skills, information technology–based support and formal approaches to planning care that take into account the specific needs of carers. Carers are a central aspect of contemporary health services, and working with carers is fundamental to the delivery of high-quality person- and family-centred nursing care. This invaluable resource helps nurses to work effectively in partnership with patients and their carers.

In this age of spiraling health care costs, it is imperative that the family's role in treating patients with chronic mental illness not be overlooked - by policy makers and clinicians alike. The families themselves insist that the government and care-providing agencies learn new ways to relate to them and patients. Helping Families Cope with Mental Illness is a comprehensive guide to the family's experience of chronic and serious mental illness for clinicians and educators in a wide range of mental health disciplines. It details all major areas of the clinician-family relationship - consumer perspectives, cultural diversity, social policy, ethical issues, practical coping strategies, research and training issues, major service issues, managed care, and cost-saving measures.