Psychodynamic Perspectives on Aging and Illness - Greenberg

The Second Edition of Psychodynamic Perspectives on Aging and Illness is a timely and superb revision which offers health-care professionals working at the mind/body interface a paradigm shift. For far too long, the wisdom of psychoanalysis as a tool to understand the suffering inherent in aging and illness has been devalued and neglected. With this update, Dr. Greenberg incontrovertibly corrects this lapse. Her integration of current scientific research, alongside a user-friendly discussion of the theory and practice of psychodynamic psychotherapy, is an important contribution to the psychology of medicine. Several topics are elaborated; the constructs of hysteria and somatization, the biology of stress, the impact of attachment history on coping with sickness as well as the experiences of trauma and grief. As with the first edition, the idea that the patient’s experience of illness cannot be understood without including the subjectivity of the practitioner who provides care is considered and done so with more awareness of this complexity. Each chapter now contains a section on “Suggested Techniques” that succinctly presents a guideline for applying the ideas set forth. Other no table aspects of the book are its reflections on the culture of medicine and the insights about the influences of contemporary Western life on the manifestation and adjustment to illness. This edition is, above all, essential for those practitioners dedicated to providing collaborative and interdisciplinary health-care which is both biologically and psychologically informed. As with the First Edition, it will continue to be required reading