Rational Psychopharmacology

"Most books about psychopharmacology focus heavily on the basic science involved and describe the currently available medications, including brief rationales for their use as well as their dosages and their side effects. Others are more for the general public, intended to help them understand how psychopharmacology might be helpful. This book is different. The goal is to teach the reader what medicines are available and what their characteristics are as well as teach very valuable skills: how to think thoroughly and methodically when assessing a patient, when reviewing research data (both basic and clinical), and when thinking through, developing, and monitoring the most effective clinical recommendations for patients. Rather than a lesson in elementary patient assessment, this book is an attempt to help readers identify weaknesses in their practice style and improve them where psychopharmacology is involved"--

The study of drug effects on behaviour and psychological processes has a long history. Developments in the decade prior to first publication had been based on a more adequate synthesis than hitherto of psychology and pharmacology, and as a result great progress was made in establishing psychopharmacology as an interdisciplinary subject in its own right. Undergraduate courses in departments of psychology and pharmacology were increasingly including some coverage of this material, but there was a paucity of texts suitable at this level at the time. Originally published in 1984, this book was designed to provide broad coverage of psychopharmacology, with the minimum necessary focus on basic pharmacology and with carefully chosen subjects which are still likely to be of interest to psychology undergraduates and in which good empirical work is available for discussion at that level. The emphasis throughout the book is on the needs of psychology students, but the contents will also interest pharmacology students.

This collection of essays examines the way psychoactive substances are described and discussed within late eighteenth- and nineteenth-century British literary and cultural texts. Covering several genres, such as novels, poetry, autobiography and non-fiction, individual essays provide insights on eighteenth- and nineteenth-century understandings of drug effects of opium, alcohol and many other plant-based substances. Contributors consider both contemporary and recent medical knowledge in order to contextualise and illuminate understandings of how drugs were utilised as stimulants, as relaxants, for pleasure, as pain relievers and for other purposes. Chapters also examine the novelty of experimentations of drugs in conversation with the way literary texts incorporate them, highlighting the importance of literary and cultural texts for addressing ethical questions.

This book challenges the validity of all traditional theories of psychopathology, particularly with regard to schizophrenia. It demonstrates that the accepted belief that schizophrenia is a brain disease is wrong, a result of the inability of traditional theories to provide an alternative explanation for the correlation between schizophrenia and genetic/neurological impairments.Psych-Bizarreness Theory (PBT), presented in this book, demonstrates that bizarre/mad behaviors, schizophrenia, criminal insanity and neuroses are rational coping mechanisms to extreme levels of emotional distress, usually depression, which are chosen by the individual to improve his quality of life. PBT integrates the scientific contributions of all traditional theories into one theoretical framework. It also integrates all therapeutic interventions of mad behaviors into one theoretical umbrella and suggests a new, humanistic therapeutic approach.

Much expanded, fully revised, and with many more new illustrations, this remains the essential text for anyone who has to master the complexities of psychopharmacology.

Disturbed Behavior in the Elderly provides information pertinent to the needs of those giving care as well as of the elderly themselves. This book presents relevant topics of contemporary psychiatric importance. Organized into four parts encompassing 11 chapters, this book begins with an overview of the clinical, administrative, and interpersonal problems posed by the elderly patient with disturbed behavior. This text then examines the rational management of disturbing behavior among the elderly in health care and other residential settings. Other chapters consider the use of medications and psychotropic drugs in old age. This book discusses as well the great value of drug therapy in alleviating the sufferings of the elderly and helping them restore the equilibrium that has been disturbed by aging, physical disability, and shrinking socio-economic network around them. The final chapter deals with staff burnout, job stress, and low morale in dealing with the elderly. This book is a valuable resource for geriatric psychiatrists and caregivers.

Create! is a Design and Technology course for Key Stage 3. It provides all the material needed to deliver the demands of the new Key Stage 3 strategy. The course follows the QCA scheme and the materials support ICT requirements. A wide range of differentiated worksheets is available on a customisable CD-ROM. The student books contain clear links to the Key Stage 3 strategy and include design-and-make assignments, product evaluations and practical tasks; each spread opens with objectives to focus the lesson, and ends with a plenary to summarise and evaluate.