The Clinician S Guide To Treating Health Anxiety

The Clinician's Guide to Treating Health Anxiety: Diagnosis, Mechanisms, and Effective Treatment provides mental health professionals with methods to better identify patients with health anxiety, the basic skills to manage it, and ways to successfully adapt cognitive behavioral therapy to treat it. The book features structured diagnostic instruments that can be used for assessment, while also underscoring the importance of conducting a comprehensive functional analysis of the patient's problems. Sections cover refinements in assessment and treatment methods and synthesize existing literature on etiology and maintenance mechanisms. Users will find an in-depth look at who develops health anxiety, what the behavioral and cognitive mechanisms that contribute to it are, why it persists in patients, and how it can be treated. Provides clinicians with tools to better identify, manage and treat health anxiety Outlines a step-by-step behavioral treatment program Looks at the similarities and differences between health anxiety and other anxiety disorders Reviews self-report instruments that can be used to measure health anxiety on a dimensional scale Includes information about recent diagnostic changes according to DSM-5

Contemporary culture includes a high awareness of personal and global health hazards. Many people may feel some anxiety in this regard, but some develop an unbearable sense of dread that prevents them from functioning. Treating Health Anxiety gives prescribing and non-prescribing clinicians, as well as the counselors and social workers who encounter the problem, the tools to reduce both the fears and the medical costs that so often accompany them.

In the recently updated Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), the diagnostic concept of hypochondriasis was eliminated and replaced by somatic symptom disorder and illness anxiety disorder. Hypochondriasis and Health Anxiety: A Guide for Clinicians, edited by Vladan Starcevic and Russell Noyes and written by prominent clinicians and researchers in the field, addresses current issues in recognizing, understanding, and treating hypochondriasis. Using a pragmatic approach, it offers a wealth of clinically useful information. The book also provides a critical review of the underlying conceptual and treatment issues, addressing varying perspectives and synthesizing the current research. Specific topics the text covers include: clinical manifestations, diagnostic and conceptual issues, classification, relationships with other disorders, assessment, epidemiology, economic aspects, course, outcome and treatment. Additionally, the book discusses patient-physician relationship in the context of hypochondriasis and health anxiety and presents cognitive, behavioral, interpersonal and psychodynamic models and treatments. The authors also address the neurobiological underpinnings of hypochondriasis and health anxiety and pharmacological treatment approaches. Based on the extensive clinical experience of its authors, there are numerous case illustrations and practical examples of how to assess, understand and manage individuals presenting with disease preoccupations, health anxiety and/or beliefs that they are seriously ill. It approaches its subject from various perspectives and is a work of integration and critical thinking about an area often shrouded in controversy.

As a mental health professional, it can be difficult to help anxious clients face their fears and anxieties. Exposure therapy is widely appreciated as one of the most effective therapeutic treatments for anxiety spectrum disorders; however, it is often underutilized due to problems that present themselves during treatment, such as client unwillingness or hesitancy, or a lack of understanding on the professional’s part regarding targeted applications. The Clinician's Guide to Exposure Therapies for Anxiety Spectrum Disorders offers guidance in creating specific exposure exercises for clients’ individual fears and phobias, as well as tools to help you and your clients overcome common roadblocks that arise during exposure therapy. In addition, this clinician’s guide presents detailed solutions and specific exposure strategies for the most common fears and phobias clients experience. You will learn to implement exposure therapy and integrate it with other evidence-based practices, such as cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), and acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). The book also includes reproducible worksheets you can use to help clients develop hierarchies of exposure and information about using prolonged exposure therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder. If you are looking for a powerful resource for treating anxiety disorders, this is it.

The Clinician's Guide to Anxiety Sensitivity Treatment and Assessment provides evidence-based strategies for clinicians looking to treat, assess and better understand anxiety sensitivity in their patients. The book delivers detailed guidance on the theoretical background and empirical support for anxiety sensitivity treatment methods, assessment strategies, and how clinicians can best prepare for sessions with their clients. Bolstered by case studies throughout, it highlights anxiety sensitivity as a transdiagnostic risk factor while also looking at the importance of lower-order sensitivity factors (physical, social, cognitive) in treatment planning, implementation and evaluation.

Treatment of Anxiety Disorders provides clinicians with an authoritative review of the epidemiology, etiology, and evaluation of anxiety disorders. Its unique and most useful feature is that each section contains a "Patient Treatment Manual" for conducting a comprehensive and effective cognitive behavioral program with each patient being treated for common anxiety disorders.

Cognitive-behavioral therapy is now the treatment of choice for individuals with health anxiety and related problems. The latest research shows that it results in reductions in health-related worries, reassurance-seeking behavior, and phobic avoidance, as well as increases in life satisfaction and everyday functioning. This compact, easy to understand book by experts Jonathan S. Abramowitz and Autumn E. Braddock opens with an overview of the diagnostic issues and assessment of health anxiety, and delineates a research-based conceptual framework for understanding the development, maintenance, and treatment of this problem. The focus of the book is a highly practical guide to implementing treatment, packed with helpful clinical pearls, therapist-patient dialogues, illustrative case vignettes, and sample forms and handouts. Readers are equipped with skills for engaging reluctant patients in treatment and tailoring educational, cognitive, and behavioral techniques for health-related anxiety. The book, which also addresses common obstacles in treatment, represents an essential resource for anyone providing services for individuals with somatoform or anxiety disorders.

Concise, yet without skimping on information, this book reviews current theory and research, addresses important diagnostic issues, and provides salient details in a number of key areas related to GAD. Assessment procedures and treatment planning are covered, along with the latest therapy outcome data, including findings on newer therapies. Also detailed are specific cognitive behavioral therapy techniques, including cognitive strategies, psychoeducation, and anxiety monitoring.