Review
Dr. Dan Rudofossi's Working with Traumatized Police-Officer Patients is thorough, clearly expressed, and, most important, sorely needed. His book will prove of great value to clinicians, police administrators, and anyone concerned with learning about real trauma and its effect on law enforcement personnel. Because he is both a "street cop" and so astute a clinician, Dr. Rudofossi was able to straddle an imposing gulf and secure the trust of those he treated. This book is a rare piece of scholarship. It's also essential reading. --Vincent M. Mansfield, Commanding Officer, Medical Division, NYPD Retired Chief, NYPD (1966-2002)
Dr. Rudofossi's comprehensive volume is intended for all those concerned with the care of psychologically traumatized workers in the field of public safety. From the first page to the last, it engages the reader in a conversation with a learned and experienced fellow therapist who is committed to his work and who has himself spent years as a police officer in New York City. The book contains illuminating case histories and an extensive review of the pertinent literature. Its author exhibits an admirable balance of enthusiasm and humility. He conveys to his readers how complex and difficult is the task to which he and they are committed, without losing any of the optimism and determination that are necessary to overcome its difficulties. --Charles Brenner, M.D., Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, State University of New York, Past President, American Psychoanalytic Association, Past President, New York Psychoanalytic Society
Working with Traumatized Police-Officer Patients is a scholarly and clinically sensitive work that illuminates the daunting emotional challenges confronting police officers in their everyday work life. Having served as a police officer himself, and as a psychologist who treats police officers, Dr. Rudofossi knows what he is talking about. In this inspiring and highly insightful volume, he clearly depicts the complex issues involved in assisting individuals who routinely place themselves in harm's way for the good of their communities. This much-needed text will prove invaluable to mental health professionals who work with police officers and with other individuals in high-risk professions. --Steve Southwick, M.D., Professor of Psychiatry, Yale School of Medicine, Deputy Director, Clinical Neuroscience Division, National Center PTSD - Veterans Administration Healthcare
Product Description
An insider perspective from a "cop doc on the job," this book is the first of its kind written in response to a need for a specialized guide for clinicians that operationally defines and responsibly treats what Dan Rudofossi terms Police and Public Safety Complex PTSD. In reading this book, you are led through an understanding of how to work with police officers who experience cumulative loss in trauma. "Doc Dan" initiates you into an original cultural competence of how and why his theory works in practice. You will leave the journey with a practical sense of how the ecological context and ethological motivation are part of the psychological presentation of almost all officers suffering from complex trauma and loss. This guide is crucial reading, original in its breadth and scope of perspective on how to intervene with the traumatized officer. Toward that end, Rudofossi presents his Eco-Ethological Existential Analysis of Police and Public Safety Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Emotive, affective, cognitive, behavioral, and existential ranges of expression of trauma are vast, diverse, and often intense in police officers. This book delivers applied theory with clinical examples, including practical interventions for the clinician and handouts for the officer-patient. The clinician will be assisted in encountering officers' existential suffering from the edge of despair to the precipice of meaning. The guide is at once stimulating, exciting, and very serious in its potential for clinical interventions.