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Though many of the ethical issues important in adult mental health are of relevance in the child, there are a considerable number of issues special to children. Many of the dilemmas faced pertain to diagnosis, treatment, the protection of the child, as well as the child's own developing intelligence and moral judgement. In addition, there are cases where the interests of the parents may conflict with the interests of the child. For example, the interests of a mother with schizophrenia might best be served by her continuing to look after her child, but the child's interests might require that a substitute placement be found.
Diagnostic Dilemmas in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry is the first in the IPPP series to explore this highly complex topic. It brings together a collection of clinicians and philosophers who consider a range of topics central to the diagnosis and treatment of children and adolescents affected by mental disorders.
List of contents
- Section One: Theoretical and Conceptual Issues
- 1: Christian Perring and Lloyd A. Wells: Theoretical and Conceptual Issues: Background and Introduction
- 2: Fayez El-Gabalawi: Child and Adolescent Psychiatry: Conceptual and Diagnostic Issues
- 3: Leen De Vreese: The Concept of Disease and our Responsibility for Children
- 4: Jorid Moen: Child and Adolescent Psychiatry between Neuroscience and the Family Perspective: a Pragmatist Approach
- 5: Benjamin Lovett and S. Brian Hood: Comoribidity in Diagnosis of Children and Adolescents: Conceptual Complications
- 6: Christian Perring: Are Relationship Problems Disorders?
- 7: Robyn Bluhm: 'Moving Parts get Broken': Neuroimaging Research and Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
- 8: Lloyd A. Wells: Psychiatric Nosology in Children and Adolescents: Past, Present, Future
- Section Two: Particular Disorders
- 9: Christian Perring and Lloyd A. Wells: Particular Disorders: Background and Introduction
- 10: John Z Sadler: Conduct Disorder as a vice-laden diagnostic concept
- 11: Sara Worley: Conduct- and Oppositional-Defiant Disorders: Pathologizing the Normal
- 12: Jennifer Vande Voort: Depression in Children and Adolescents
- 13: Lloyd A. Wells: Bipolar Disorder in Historical Perspective
- 14: Bhanu Prakash Kolla: The Beginning of Wisdom is calling things by their Right Name: A Critique of the Broad Concept of Pediatric Bipolar Disorder using the Robins and Guze model
About the author
Christian Perring is Professor of Philosophy at Dowling College, NY. He has academic degrees from Oxford University, King's College London, and Princeton University. He is a member of the executive council for the Association for the Advancement of Philosophy and Psychiatry, and he is the editor of Metapsychology Online Reviews. His research interests are in philosophy of psychiatry, philosophy of psychology, and moral psychology, with particular focus on issues of the moral responsibility of people with mental illness, the classification of disorders in child and adolescent psychiatry, and the role of scientific reductionism in psychiatry. He teaches in a wide variety of areas, including medical ethics, the philosophy of law, the philosophy of sex and love, and the history of psychology.
Dr. Wells recently retired after a thirty-nine year career at Mayo Clinic, where he worked in the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. For twenty-two years he was Chair of the Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. For twelve years he served as Vice-Chair of the department, in charge of education issues. For more than twenty years he was medical director of the inpatient child and adolescent psychiatry unit. Dr. Wells was a course director in the medical school for almost twenty years and served as program director for the residency programs in child and adolescent psychiatry and general psychiatry. He examined on the general psychiatry Boards and served as education chair for the Society of Professors of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
Summary
Within child and adolescent psychiatry, there are a number of potential dilemmas pertaining to diagnosis, treatment, the protection of the child, as well as the child's own developing intelligence and moral judgement. Diagnostic Dilemmas in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry is the first in the IPPP series to explore this highly complex topic.
Additional text
It is about time that a book focuses entirely on child and adolescent psychiatry. Diagnostic Dilemmas in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry analyzes, critiques, and offers alternative perspectives on a range of topics including concepts of childhood mental disease, diagnosis and over-diagnosis, the use of neuroimaging of children, and issues of comorbidity, all informed by intersections of philosophy and psychiatry. Readers will also find clear critiques of particular diagnoses such as conduct disorder, pediatric bipolar disorder, depression, and ADHD. The editors are to be commended for putting such a fine volume together. This volume is a must-read for anyone interested in better understanding childhood behavior, and distress and the values that inform our judgments: child psychiatrists, philosophers, social workers, psychologists, and sociologists.
