Using DSM-IV: A Clinician's Guide to Psychiatric Diagnosis [Paperback]

Anthony LaBruzza (Author), Jose M. Mendez-Villarrubia (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0765700530 | ISBN-13: 978-0765700537 | Publication Date: June 1, 1997 | Edition: 1

DSM-IV is here, and mental health professionals—whether they applaud its rigor or decry its rigidity—will have to know how to use it. Like its predecessor, DSM-III, DSM-IV is empirically based and atheoretical. The psychodynamics of mental disorders and their etiologies are not considered. Its principal advantage is that it provides a reliable system of diagnosis. Its principal flaw is that it can lead the clinician to focus too exclusively on categorizing symptom clusters rather then on empathically understanding the person who is suffering the symptoms. In Using DSM-IV: A Clinician's Guide to Psychiatric Diagnosis, LaBruzza and Mendez-Villarrubia offer the needed supplement to the DSM-IV. Their book, a veritable road map for DSM-IV, explains the technical language and hierarchical classifications of DSM-IV while it demonstrates how the system can be adapted to a clinical approach.

Editorial Reviews

Review

This book will be welcomed by many with both gratitude and relief: an engaging, thoughtful, moral, and humanistically responsible guide to the DSM-IV. This erudite and thoroughly readable work should be used generously as an indispensable and required text for psychopathology courses in all training institutions for mental health professionals. The explicit focus on issues of diversity in culture, gender, ethnicity, and sexual orientation is not only laudable for its presence, but for its clarity of exposition. (Ellenhorn, Theodore J. Ph.D )

LaBruzza and Méndez-Villarrubia have written a highly readable companion book to DSM-IV. The unique chapter dealing with mental illness in Hispanic cultures is particularly informative. This volume will be very useful for a wide range of mental health professionals. (Malcolm B. Bowers, Jr., M.D. )

Dr. LaBruzza goes beyond making DSM-IV user friendly. He brings a descriptive manual to life by placing it in the context of the broad scope of Western thought about the form and nature of mental illness. (Peter Kramer, M.D. )

A real lodestar for mental health professionals that explains the whys, wheres, and whens of our latest diagnostic bible and its development. This book, less than half the size of the DSM-IV, is a gem of information and erudition that should be within reach of any colleague involved in patient evaluation. (Stephen Fleck, M.D. )

About the Author

Anthony L. LaBruzza, M.D., a psychiatrist, is chief of medicine and medical director of the Community Services Division at the Greater Bridgeport Community Mental Health Center in Bridgeport, Connecticut. José M. Méndez-Villarrubia, M.A., is a doctoral candidate in clinical psychology. He is currently on the clinical staff at the Greater Bridgeport Community Mental Health Center.

Product Details

• Paperback: 460 pages
• Publisher: Jason Aronson, Inc.; 1 edition (June 1, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0765700530
• ISBN-13: 978-0765700537
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #696,659 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An outstading resource for mental health professionals, July 22, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Using DSM-IV: A Clinician's Guide to Psychiatric Diagnosis (Paperback)

This is a wonderful book. The authors are clearly excellent clinicians who have made the DSM-IV accessible to mental health providers. Their critique of the history and development of the DSM is suberb, and their chapter on cross-cultural assessment is a gem. A must read for all mental health providers.