Prescribing Mental Health Medication

Prescribing Mental Health Medication is a text for practitioners who treat mental disorders with medication. It explains the entire process of medication assessment, management and follow up for general medical practitioners, mental health practitioners, students, residents, prescribing nurses and others perfecting this skill. Already used by providers and training institutions throughout the world, the newly revised second edition is completely updated and focuses on the following key issues: How to determine if medication is needed Proper dosing and how to start and stop medication When to change medication Dealing with difficult patients Specific mental health symptoms and appropriate medication Special populations including pregnant women, substance abusers, children and adolescents, and the elderly Monitoring medication with blood levels Management of medication side effects and avoidance of medication risk The misuse of medication Prescription of generic preparations Prescriptions via the Internet, telemedicine, and electronic medical records Organizing a prescriptive office and record-keeping Completely updated, this text includes information on all psychotropic medications in use in the United States and the United Kingdom. It incorporates clinical tips, sample dialogues for talking about medications to patients, and information specifically relevant in primary care settings.

Prescribing Mental Health Medication is a text for nursing and medical practitioners who are learning how to diagnose and treat mental disorders with medication. Skills-based, it focuses on the following key issues: how to start and stop medication how to dose when to change medication dealing with particular kinds of patients specific illnesses and their medication special populations and conditions the management of side effects practical issues such as monitoring medication with blood levels administrative issues such as record-keeping. Special icons used throughout the text highlight clinical tips, advice on how to talk to patients and differences in practice in primary care settings. Based on the author's considerable experience of training nursing and medical staff, Prescribing Mental Health Medication presents complex topics in an organized, logical and easily assimilated format. It provides a supportive text for those new to prescribing and a comprehensive source of reference for more experienced practitioners or teachers.

This manual attempts to provide simple, adequate and evidence-based information to health care professionals in primary health care especially in low- and middle-income countries to be able to provide pharmacological treatment to persons with mental disorders. The manual contains basic principles of prescribing followed by chapters on medicines used in psychotic disorders; depressive disorders; bipolar disorders; generalized anxiety and sleep disorders; obsessive compulsive disorders and panic attacks; and alcohol and opioid dependence. The annexes provide information on evidence retrieval, assessment and synthesis and the peer view process.

Prescribing Mental Health Medication is a comprehensive text for all practitioners who treat mental disorders with medication. This new (third) edition is fully updated and includes a variety of additional chapters. Prescribing Mental Health Medication covers the latest digital methodologies including Internet-based mental health treatment, electronic medical records and prescriber use of social media. Including information on all psychotropic medications in use in the United States and the United Kingdom, the book incorporates clinical tips, sample dialogues for talking about mental health medications to patients, and information specifically relevant in primary care settings. It looks at: • how to determine if medication is needed, proper dosing and how to start, stop and change medication • specific mental health symptoms and appropriate medication • special populations including non-adherent patients, medication abusers, those mixing alcohol and psychotropics, confused patients, children, adolescents, pregnant women and seniors • management of medication side effects and avoidance of medication risk • prescription of generic preparations • organizing a prescriptive office and record keeping. The additional chapters in this new edition of Prescribing Mental Health Medication cover topics such as combining specific medications, combining medications and psychological therapies, use of 'natural' substances in mental health treatment, successfully managing patient relapse, and appropriate prescriptions of potentially controversial medications such as stimulants and benzodiazepines. This practical text explains the entire process of medication assessment, management and follow up for general medical practitioners, mental health practitioners, students, residents, prescribing nurses and others perfecting this skill.

The Maudsley® Prescribing Guidelines in Psychiatry The new edition of the world-renowned reference guide on the use of medications for patients presenting with mental health problems The Maudsley Prescribing Guidelines in Psychiatry is the essential evidence-based handbook on the safe and effective prescribing of psychotropic agents. Covering both common and complex prescribing situations encountered in day-to-day clinical practice, this comprehensive resource provides expert guidance on drug choice, minimum and maximum doses, adverse effects, switching medications, prescribing for special patient groups, and more. Each clear and concise chapter includes an up-to-date reference list providing easy access to the evidence on which the guidance is based. The fourteenth edition has been fully updated to incorporate the latest available research, the most recent psychotropic drug introductions, and all psychotropic drugs currently used in the UK, USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan. Several new sections cover topics such as deprescribing of major psychiatric drugs, prescribing psychotropics at the end of life, the treatment of agitated delirium, the genetics of clozapine prescribing, the use of weekly penfluridol, and the treatment of psychotropic withdrawal. Featuring contributions by an experienced team of psychiatrists and specialist pharmacists, the new edition of The Maudsley Prescribing Guidelines in Psychiatry: Provides succinct coverage of drug treatment of psychiatric conditions and formulating prescribing policy in mental health Covers a wide range of psychiatric conditions including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, depression and anxiety, borderline personality, eating disorders, and many others Provides advice on prescribing for children and adolescents, older people, pregnant women, and other special patient groups Offers new sections on genetic prescribing, long-acting injectable formulations, ketamine administration and uses, and dopamine super-sensitivity Includes referenced information on off-label prescribing, potential interactions with other substances such as alcohol, tobacco, and caffeine, and treating patients with comorbid physical conditions Whether in the doctor’s office, in the clinic, or on the ward, The Maudsley Prescribing Guidelines in Psychiatry, Fourteenth Edition is a must-have for psychiatrists, pharmacists, neuropharmacologists, clinical psychologists, nurses, and other healthcare professionals working in mental health, as well as trainees and students in medicine, pharmacy, and nursing.

The current state of medicine has witnessed the long-term adverse effects of certain medications, an increased rate of polypharmacy, and a cultural shift that emphasizes patient-centered practice. The term "deprescribing" refers to the optimization of the pharmacological regimen by reducing or cessing medications that incur more risks than benefits. Many people consider stopping their psychiatric medications, but prescribers may not know how to do this in a collaborative, systematic way. Deprescribing in Psychiatry presents a framework for deprescribing to guide the prescriber-patient dyad through the process of deciding if and when to reduce psychiatric medication, how to go about doing it, and at the same time, acknowledge the inherent risks in such an endeavour. As the first book on the subject, Deprescribing in Psychiatry stands to serve as a definitive text in this burgeoning field and as a 'rallying call' to raise crucial and topical questions in psychiatric practice, promote innovation, and act as a resource on the current state-of-the-art care. It describes the ins and outs of how clinicians can work closely with their patients to consider whether or not to try decreasing medications. It also discusses the anticipated future research directions, considerations for the field, and emphasizes collaboration with the patient, transparency, and the acknowledgement of uncertainty in psychiatric practice.

IN THIS STIRRING AND BEAUTIFULLY WRITTEN WAKE-UP CALL, psychiatrist Daniel Carlat exposes deeply disturbing problems plaguing his profession, revealing the ways it has abandoned its essential purpose: to understand the mind, so that psychiatrists can heal mental illness and not just treat symptoms. As he did in his hard-hitting and widely read New York Times Magazine article "Dr. Drug Rep," and as he continues to do in his popular watchdog newsletter, The Carlat Psychiatry Report, he writes with bracing honesty about how psychiatry has so largely forsaken the practice of talk therapy for the seductive—and more lucrative—practice of simply prescribing drugs, with a host of deeply troubling consequences. Psychiatrists have settled for treating symptoms rather than causes, embracing the apparent medical rigor of DSM diagnoses and prescription in place of learning the more challenging craft of therapeutic counseling, gaining only limited understanding of their patients’ lives. Talk therapy takes time, whereas the fifteen-minute "med check" allows for more patients and more insurance company reimbursement. Yet DSM diagnoses, he shows, are premised on a good deal less science than we would think. Writing from an insider’s perspective, with refreshing forthrightness about his own daily struggles as a practitioner, Dr. Carlat shares a wealth of stories from his own practice and those of others that demonstrate the glaring shortcomings of the standard fifteen-minute patient visit. He also reveals the dangers of rampant diagnoses of bipolar disorder, ADHD, and other "popular" psychiatric disorders, and exposes the risks of the cocktails of medications so many patients are put on. Especially disturbing are the terrible consequences of overprescription of drugs to children of ever younger ages. Taking us on a tour of the world of pharmaceutical marketing, he also reveals the inner workings of collusion between psychiatrists and drug companies. Concluding with a road map for exactly how the profession should be reformed, Unhinged is vital reading for all those in treatment or considering it, as well as a stirring call to action for the large community of psychiatrists themselves. As physicians and drug companies continue to work together in disquieting and harmful ways, and as diagnoses—and misdiagnoses—of mental disorders skyrocket, it’s essential that Dr. Carlat’s bold call for reform is heeded.

What if, rather than being dispensers of medication, mental health clinicians and primary care clinicians treating mental disorders were collaborators with patients in the prescribing relationship? To prescribe more effectively and to achieve health equity, Warren Kinghorn and Abraham Nussbaum argue, it's necessary--and in Prescribing Together, they offer a roadmap for making it a reality. In these pages, readers will find practical introductions to key concepts, from cultural formation and structural competency to collaborative deprescribing, and profiles, enlivened by personal anecdotes, of a diverse group of accomplished clinicians that offer evidence-based strategies for building strong alliances in the context of 13 mental disorder categories, including generalized anxiety disorder, major depressive disorder, borderline personality disorder, and neurocognitive disorders. By focusing on how, rather than what, to prescribe, this book makes room for patients' lived experiences and interpersonal and social contexts, returning to them a sense of agency and empowering them to set meaningful goals and to be active participants in their own flourishing.