Mental Illness and the Body : Beyond Diagnosis

ISBN-13: 9780415383219 / Angielski / Miękka / 2006 / 196 str.

Louise Phillips

Opis

Observation of the body helps psychiatrists to determine the cause and treatment of mental illness. To form a diagnosis, practitioners conduct detailed observations of patients' appearance, posture, gesture and gait, thereby using the body as a diagnostic index. However, within routine mental health practice, there is little consideration of how the bodily presentation of patients may reflect aspects of their "lived experience."
With reference to a range of theoretical perspectives including philosophy, psychoanalysis, feminism and sociology, Mental Illness and the Body explores the ways in which understanding "lived experience" may usefully be applied to mental health practice. Key features include:
- an outline of history British psychiatry including treatments
- interviews with a variety of psychiatrists and nurses
- an analysis of feminism and the way its insights have been applied to understanding mental health and illness
- in-depth interviews with eight patients diagnosed with mental illness
"Mental Illness and the Body" is essential reading for mental health practitioners, allied professionals and anyone with an interest in the body and mental illness.

Spis treści

Preface  1. Introduction  2. Lived Experience  3. Bodily Inscription  4. Women Speaking  5. Unspoken Distress  6. Psychosis  7. The Practitioner's Body  8. The Patient's Body  9. Developing Practice

O autorze

Louise Phillips is a lecturer in Mental Health at City University and a mental health nurse. She has practiced for the past 18 years in a variety of settings including elderly care, the voluntary sector and the NHS. Immediately before starting her academic career, she worked for a number of years as a Community Psychiatric Nurse in the King’s Cross area of London. In addition to her nursing qualification she has a BA in European Cultural History and completed her PhD on approaches to the body and mental illness at the university of Kent at Canterbury in March 2003.