the Journal of
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“Outstanding . . . . Each chapter includes a plethora of references, and occasional charts and graphs, which complemented and extended the written material extremely well. . . . A major strength of this book is the writing style. [It] reads like an annotated transcript of a didactic lecture delivered by a highly trained professor who makes sure that you understand what is being said before moving on. I would have no problem giving sections of this book to parents to read, or to schoolteachers during an in-service presentation. . . . I will recommend that our residency program and clinic purchase a copy.” |
Child & Adolescent Mental Health: A Practical, All-in-One Guide
About twenty percent of children and adolescents in the United States — that’s roughly fifteen million kids — have a diagnosable mental health condition. Odds are, you know one, or have one, yourself: a child who struggles to control their emotions and behaviors, or has a hard time in school or relating to others.
Whatever happened to our free-spirited, happy, socially adjusted, emotionally stable children and adolescents, you might ask. They still exist. But it’s a widely accepted fact in psychiatry and clinical psychotherapy that children and adolescents are dealing with an increased number of educational, social, emotional, familial, and environmental stressors than in previous eras.
This sometimes leads to substance abuse, which affects about half of high-school seniors. Many of these same high-school seniors have traumatic histories (witnessing abuse, being abused, and so on), and many are at an increased risk for substance abuse, mental health challenges, and social challenges. To make matters worse, children and adolescents who have traumatic histories and who have experimented with an illicit drug also have an increased risk for sexually-transmitted diseases, smoking, and even obesity, all of which are all leading causes of death.
And there’s more. Children and adolescents who are of color and/or who come from lower socioeconomic backgrounds face even more challenges in accessing mental health services. As a therapist working with this population, I frequently see that children of color and children who come from families with less money are disproportionately disenfranchised in the mental health system.
For decades, the focus of mental health attention and research has been on adults. As a result, we, as a society and as a group of professionals, lack knowledge (and research) on how to best identify and treat childhood psychopathology, primarily psychotic disorders such a schizophrenia, trauma, suicide, and self-injurious behaviors. Now, Jess Shatkin, an associate professor of child and adolescent psychiatry and pediatrics at NYU, has written Child & Adolescent Mental Health: A Practical, All-in-One Guide. Shatkin not only recognizes that child and adolescent mental health is an overlooked topic and receives very little to no press, but he also recognizes that we are overdue for a clinical resource specifically geared toward child and adolescent statistics, research, and treatment.
The book highlights the mental, emotional, and behavioral challenges faced by young people today. One major challenge is the lack of available therapists, social workers, and psychiatrists who specialize in this population. As Shatkin writes, “the United States Federal Bureau of Health Professions has named child and adolescent psychiatry as the most underserved of all medical specialties.”
Sadly, child and adolescent psychiatry and clinical psychotherapy tend to provide very little financial stability for healthcare practitioners, which probably relates to the shortage of professionals in the field. Shatkin explains that “children represent an underserved and disenfranchised group with no voice of their own when it comes to policy and organizational decision-making” — and to make matters worse, the stigma of mental health and psychiatric treatment continues to be a huge barrier for many families.
Shatkin’s book is, on the one hand, comprehensive, with a review of common psychiatric concerns such as schizophrenia, mood disorders, substance-abuse disorders, eating disorders, anxiety disorders, disruptive-behavior disorders, autism-spectrum disorders, and intellectual disabilities. However, there are some drawbacks to his guide. Some readers might perceive the book as only catering to the socially-acceptable constructs of mental illness. Shatkin’s main goal seems to be supporting the complex and sometimes disliked DSM.
Readers may also see the book as overly black-and-white, skipping over the grey areas of mental health: reactive-attachment disorder or adolescents who exhibit borderline personality traits; access to fair mental health treatment; cultural barriers in diagnosing a mental illness; medication management and why some medications are not effective for some people, even in high doses. About these, Shatkin does not help much. If I were a desperate parent seeking information about my child’s severe bipolar disorder, for example, which tends to be very resistant to high amounts of Geodon or Abililfy after repeated trials, I would probably find this book quite detached from the complex issues my child and I were facing.
That said, as a therapist with a specialization in child and adolescent mental health, I was quite ecstatic to receive an all-in-one book that functions like a demographically-targeted DSM. Shatkin provides hardcore facts and current research, and can help clinicians who need a quick reference guide.
Reviewed by Tamara Hill, MS
Whatever happened to our free-spirited, happy, socially adjusted, emotionally stable children and adolescents, you might ask. They still exist. But it’s a widely accepted fact in psychiatry and clinical psychotherapy that children and adolescents are dealing with an increased number of educational, social, emotional, familial, and environmental stressors than in previous eras.
This sometimes leads to substance abuse, which affects about half of high-school seniors. Many of these same high-school seniors have traumatic histories (witnessing abuse, being abused, and so on), and many are at an increased risk for substance abuse, mental health challenges, and social challenges. To make matters worse, children and adolescents who have traumatic histories and who have experimented with an illicit drug also have an increased risk for sexually-transmitted diseases, smoking, and even obesity, all of which are all leading causes of death.
And there’s more. Children and adolescents who are of color and/or who come from lower socioeconomic backgrounds face even more challenges in accessing mental health services. As a therapist working with this population, I frequently see that children of color and children who come from families with less money are disproportionately disenfranchised in the mental health system.
For decades, the focus of mental health attention and research has been on adults. As a result, we, as a society and as a group of professionals, lack knowledge (and research) on how to best identify and treat childhood psychopathology, primarily psychotic disorders such a schizophrenia, trauma, suicide, and self-injurious behaviors. Now, Jess Shatkin, an associate professor of child and adolescent psychiatry and pediatrics at NYU, has written Child & Adolescent Mental Health: A Practical, All-in-One Guide. Shatkin not only recognizes that child and adolescent mental health is an overlooked topic and receives very little to no press, but he also recognizes that we are overdue for a clinical resource specifically geared toward child and adolescent statistics, research, and treatment.
The book highlights the mental, emotional, and behavioral challenges faced by young people today. One major challenge is the lack of available therapists, social workers, and psychiatrists who specialize in this population. As Shatkin writes, “the United States Federal Bureau of Health Professions has named child and adolescent psychiatry as the most underserved of all medical specialties.”
Sadly, child and adolescent psychiatry and clinical psychotherapy tend to provide very little financial stability for healthcare practitioners, which probably relates to the shortage of professionals in the field. Shatkin explains that “children represent an underserved and disenfranchised group with no voice of their own when it comes to policy and organizational decision-making” — and to make matters worse, the stigma of mental health and psychiatric treatment continues to be a huge barrier for many families.
Shatkin’s book is, on the one hand, comprehensive, with a review of common psychiatric concerns such as schizophrenia, mood disorders, substance-abuse disorders, eating disorders, anxiety disorders, disruptive-behavior disorders, autism-spectrum disorders, and intellectual disabilities. However, there are some drawbacks to his guide. Some readers might perceive the book as only catering to the socially-acceptable constructs of mental illness. Shatkin’s main goal seems to be supporting the complex and sometimes disliked DSM.
Readers may also see the book as overly black-and-white, skipping over the grey areas of mental health: reactive-attachment disorder or adolescents who exhibit borderline personality traits; access to fair mental health treatment; cultural barriers in diagnosing a mental illness; medication management and why some medications are not effective for some people, even in high doses. About these, Shatkin does not help much. If I were a desperate parent seeking information about my child’s severe bipolar disorder, for example, which tends to be very resistant to high amounts of Geodon or Abililfy after repeated trials, I would probably find this book quite detached from the complex issues my child and I were facing.
That said, as a therapist with a specialization in child and adolescent mental health, I was quite ecstatic to receive an all-in-one book that functions like a demographically-targeted DSM. Shatkin provides hardcore facts and current research, and can help clinicians who need a quick reference guide.
Reviewed by Tamara Hill, MS
AACAP News
Volume 41, Issue 5
Peptalk
Issue 51 (Winter 2011)
Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (JAACAP)
Book Review
Review: Treating Child and Adolescent Mental illness: a practical, all-in-one guide
(2009)
Book review by Felipe Picon
The field of child and adolescence psychiatry has evolved extensively in recent years with new psychopharmacological approaches, refinements in the evaluation process and advances in the various forms of psychotherapy. In this context of effervescence, the work of Jess P. Shatkin, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at New York University and Director of Education and Training at the NYU Child Study Center, brings us a nice update on the treatment of mental disorders in children and adolescents. His book has the exact depth to meet the goal of being a practical guide in a single volume covering all treatments in pediatric psychiatry.
The book is divided into 15 chapters with the various disorders that affect our children and adolescents. They are: Introduction, ADHD, Disruptive Behavior Disorders, Learning Disorders, Language Disorders, Mental Retardation, Autism Spectrum Disorders, Tourette’s and Tic Disorders, Anxiety Disorders, Depression, Bipolar Disorder, Schizophrenia and psychosis, substance use disorders, Eating Disorders and Sleep Disorders. He closes the book with an appendix which provides a quick review of the history of pediatric psychopharmacology, the process of evaluation and treatment with this population, and a critical analysis of the issue of Black Box Warnings posed by the Food and Drug Administration on antidepressants regarding the increase the occurrence of suicides with the use of these drugs.
Each chapter presents the historical background of each disorder, clinical presentation, etiology and recent advances in research (e.g., neuroscience, genetics, neuroendocrinology, etc.), epidemiology, clinical course, diagnosis, and evidence-based treatments. The book is not limited to psychopharmacological treatments and also provides up to date scientific evidence on the various forms of psychotherapy that are now indicated, with heavy reliance upon neurobiological, cognitive, behavioral and systemic approaches. The text also presents us with the evidence from studies that support the therapeutic measures and points out where there is lack of scientific knowledge. Another aspect of great clinical utility is the various psychometric scales that are included within the text and referenced throughout, particularly as they apply to daily practice in the evaluation of child and adolescent psychiatric disorders.
Quite fluidly, his work is attractive both to specialists in the field of child and adolescent psychiatry as well as graduate students and residents. It provides a comprehensive review for the more experienced and fast and practical knowledge for the beginner. The book will also be very useful as a guide and reference manual for seminars on child and adolescent mental health. This book achieves its goal of being a concise text on the various therapeutic approaches while also including data and references on the current psychiatric evidence-base. Shatkin’s Treating Child and Adolescent Mental Illness is undoubtedly highly recommended for professionals who deal daily with the treatment of children and adolescents suffering from mental disorders.
The field of child and adolescence psychiatry has evolved extensively in recent years with new psychopharmacological approaches, refinements in the evaluation process and advances in the various forms of psychotherapy. In this context of effervescence, the work of Jess P. Shatkin, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics and Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at New York University and Director of Education and Training at the NYU Child Study Center, brings us a nice update on the treatment of mental disorders in children and adolescents. His book has the exact depth to meet the goal of being a practical guide in a single volume covering all treatments in pediatric psychiatry.
The book is divided into 15 chapters with the various disorders that affect our children and adolescents. They are: Introduction, ADHD, Disruptive Behavior Disorders, Learning Disorders, Language Disorders, Mental Retardation, Autism Spectrum Disorders, Tourette’s and Tic Disorders, Anxiety Disorders, Depression, Bipolar Disorder, Schizophrenia and psychosis, substance use disorders, Eating Disorders and Sleep Disorders. He closes the book with an appendix which provides a quick review of the history of pediatric psychopharmacology, the process of evaluation and treatment with this population, and a critical analysis of the issue of Black Box Warnings posed by the Food and Drug Administration on antidepressants regarding the increase the occurrence of suicides with the use of these drugs.
Each chapter presents the historical background of each disorder, clinical presentation, etiology and recent advances in research (e.g., neuroscience, genetics, neuroendocrinology, etc.), epidemiology, clinical course, diagnosis, and evidence-based treatments. The book is not limited to psychopharmacological treatments and also provides up to date scientific evidence on the various forms of psychotherapy that are now indicated, with heavy reliance upon neurobiological, cognitive, behavioral and systemic approaches. The text also presents us with the evidence from studies that support the therapeutic measures and points out where there is lack of scientific knowledge. Another aspect of great clinical utility is the various psychometric scales that are included within the text and referenced throughout, particularly as they apply to daily practice in the evaluation of child and adolescent psychiatric disorders.
Quite fluidly, his work is attractive both to specialists in the field of child and adolescent psychiatry as well as graduate students and residents. It provides a comprehensive review for the more experienced and fast and practical knowledge for the beginner. The book will also be very useful as a guide and reference manual for seminars on child and adolescent mental health. This book achieves its goal of being a concise text on the various therapeutic approaches while also including data and references on the current psychiatric evidence-base. Shatkin’s Treating Child and Adolescent Mental Illness is undoubtedly highly recommended for professionals who deal daily with the treatment of children and adolescents suffering from mental disorders.
Treating Child and Adolescent Mental Illness: A Practical, All-In-One Guide
Book Review (2009)
Psychiatric Times
Book Review (2010)