Brian Leonard and Paul Spenser, eds. Colchester: Portland Press, 1991, 516 pp ISBN 1-869868-74-9 The Royal College of Psychiatrists and the Royal College of General Practitioners launched a 5-year Defeat Depression Campaign on 30 January 1992. The first year of the campaign is intended to educate health professionals in the recognition and treatment of depression. This book, which is the proceedings of the Conference of the British Society for Psycho-Pharmacology held in Ireland in ... Read More

Managing Mental Health Problems. A Practical Guide for Primary Care Nick Kates, Marilyn Craven Hogrefe & Huber Publishers, 12 Bruce Park Ave, Toronto, ON M4P 2S3 1998/390 pp Strengths Practical, useful instruction Weaknesses Not comprehensive For a long time, managing mental health problems in primary care has been poorly understood and criticized by physicians not principally involved in primary care. I believe this misunderstanding stems in part from not having defined the skill set unique to family practice. Therefore, ... Read More

Linda Denise Oakley, Claudette Potter Mosby-Year Book, Inc, 11830 Westline Industrial Dr, St Louis, MO 63146 USA 1997/448 pp Strengths Assessment and DSM-IV diagnosis Weakness Specific pharmacologie treatment Audience Family physicians and allied mental health professionals The authors of this ambitious book state, "We have developed a book for primary care practitioners that presents everything from basic mental concepts and terms to clinical examples of psychiatric primary care." The book is divided into five parts that deal with basic concepts ... Read More

Helping Your Depressed Teenager. A Guide for Parents and Caregivers Gerald D. Oster, Sarah S. Montgomery John Wiley & Sons Canada, Ltd, 5353 Dundas St W, 4th Floor, Etobicoke, ON M9B 6H8 1995/184 pp Strengths Very informative, logical presentation, useful bibliography and resource list Weaknesses Support groups mostly in the United States Adolescents are not just "big children" or "little adults." They represent a separate stage in the transition from infancy to old age. The authors have written an ... Read More

Psychological Problems in General Practice A.C. Markus; C. Murray Parkes; P. Tomson; M.Johnston Oxford University Press, 70 Wynford Dr, Don Mills, ON M3C IJ9 1989/406 pp The authors believe that psychiatry in general practice is a different specialty from psychiatry in hospitals. The authors suggest that a problem-oriented model is more appropriate to family practice. The authors also believe that psychoanalysis is a frame of reference that has outlived its usefulness and have introduced ... Read More

Research Methods in Psychiatry: A beginner's guide Chris Freeman and Peter tyrer (eds) The Royal College of Psychiatrists, London 1989, 240 pages Not every doctor will become a dedicated researcher but an understanding of research principles and methods is essential for effective critical enquiry or performance review and thus for improved patient care. Like their psychiatrist colleagues, general practitioner trainees increasingly accept the link between individual research and better clinical practice. Chris Freeman and ... Read More

Trevor J Powell and Simon J Enright Routledge, Chapman and Hall, London 1989, 196 pages This useful book is the first in a series on strategies for mental health. Forthcoming titles will include Assertiveness training, Bereavement and loss and Rehabilitation and community care. If these volumes are of the same high standard as this book then they may, as the series title implies, have a positive effect on mental health. The contents of this ... Read More

Helen Kennerley Oxford University Press 1990, 177 pages Anxious patients can be treated in many ways and as general practitioners we have numerous opportunities for exercising our therapeutic skills. Tranquillizers have had a bad press lately so it is good to be reminded that psychological methods have been steadily simplified over the years, are at least as effective as drug treatment and are a good deal safer. This deceptively slim volume is addressed to ... Read More

Friedman S, editor New York, London: The Guilford Press; 1997. 261 pp. with index ISBN 1-57230-237-2 Anxiety is a profound human experience. Anxiety disorders are universal in human societies, although the diagnostic patterns vary over time and from one place to another. This volume describes some culturally bound anxiety syndromes, but dwells on the diagnostic categories of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, third (DSM-III), third ... Read More

Cohen S, Kessler RC, Underwood Gordon L, editors New York: Oxford University Press; 1997. 236 pp. with index ISBN 0-19-512120-1 (paper) "Stress" has become such an overused word that it is now almost a cliché. The Oxford English Dictionary has 10 different meanings for it. Because of these terminological difficulties, some consider that it should be discarded from the medical lexicon altogether. Nevertheless, "stress" has developed ... Read More