Treatment of Late-Life Depression, Anxiety, Trauma, and Substance Abuse

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Psychology

Patricia A. Areán

American Psychological Association

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264 pages

Working with older adults no longer means working exclusively with frail or disabled people. Older adults are healthier now on average than in decades past, but they still require specialized care. Mental health providers are seeing a growing number of older patients in their practice and may have little experience in the best methods for working with them.

To fill that gap, Patricia A. Areán assembled this volume of best practices in treating mental disorders in late life. It includes an overview of geropsychology and the training resources available to help clinicians develop the competencies they need to work with older adults.

Chapters focus on evidence-based treatments for late-life depression, anxiety, trauma, and substance abuse disorders, including cognitive behavioral therapy, problem solving treatment, behavioral activation, interpersonal therapy, relaxation training, exposure therapy, substance abuse relapse prevention, and motivational interviewing. Detailed case examples in each chapter illustrate the interventions in action.

Although mental disorders are not as common in later life as they are in younger populations, they can be disabling and costly. With the accumulation of evidence over the past twenty-five years, assumptions about whether older adults can benefit from psychotherapy have changed greatly. Not only is psychotherapy a more effective treatment option than medication for many older adults, the effects are as good as those seen in younger adults.

This book will help mental health providers take advantage of the latest research and be more effective in their work with older adults.

Patricia A. Areán

Patricia A. Areán, PhD, is a professor in the department of psychiatry at the University of California, San Francisco, and a licensed clinical psychologist. Dr. Areán is an international expert on the effectiveness of behavioral interventions for mood disorders, in particular on adapting these interventions for a variety of health and mental health settings (primary care medicine, assisted living, social service, mental health) and more recently on mobile health applications. Since 1994, she has published more than 100 peer-reviewed articles on these topics and has been funded by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), National Institute on Aging,National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, and the Hartford Foundation. She is currently funded by NIMH to study the effectiveness of brain games and mobile health apps on mood. Dr. Areán's work has won national recognition, resulting in an early career award from APA, a midcareer Award from the National Institutes of Health for her work on disseminating evidence-based practices, and the Award for Achievements in Diversity in Mental Health from the American Association of Geriatric Psychiatry. Dr. Areán currently leads an interdisciplinary research team of researchers from diverse backgrounds, including social work, nursing, psychiatry, family and general medicine, medical sociology, and clinical psychology.

Agence Schweiger