Deconstructing ADHD: Mental Disorder or Social Construct? is the third volume of the Ethics International Press Critical Psychology and Critical Psychiatry Series. Understanding the current systems of psychology and psychiatry is profoundly important. So is exploring alternatives. The Critical Psychology and Critical Psychiatry Series presents solicited chapters from international experts on a wide variety of underexplored subjects. This is a series for mental health researchers, teachers, and practitioners, for parents and interested lay readers, and for anyone trying to make sense of anxiety, depression, and other emotional difficulties. Millions of children and their parents worldwide are affected by the current biomedical paradigm by which childhood mental illnesses are addressed. This volume focuses on the “mental disorder” known as ADHD and examines whether or not it should be considered a mental disorder, and how the observable behaviors that get a child an ADHD label can be remediated without the use of powerful gateway chemicals.

Beyond ADHD weaves Emmerson’s personal story of his ADHD diagnosis, exploring along the way the latest medical, scientific and societal explanations and tools for managing and living with the condition. Including interviews with a number of experts at the forefront of next-generation ADHD diagnostics and treatment, he questions the cookie-cutter way ADHD is commonly diagnosed and treated. Suggesting that the list of symptoms often used to identify ADHD can be attributed to many other disorders and conditions, he explores how and why ADHD diagnoses have increased by 50% in the last ten years. Emmerson advocates a different approach to ADHD, arguing that it should be a diagnosis of exclusion rather than the other way around, and that we must look past the label, recognizing that individual symptoms vary and treatment plans should be better tailored to the individual. He examines mental and behavioral issues from all sides, including the possibility that nurturing – rather than trying to alter or suppress – the active, “360-degree” mind is a viable way for those diagnosed with ADHD to realize their gifts and lead purposeful lives.

This book brings together, for the first time, a selection of international critiques on the role of ADHD in our society today, looking at how diagnoses have increased in recent years and the reasons behind this. Topics range from genetics to social culture, offering a comprehensive overview of this area.

ADHD is one of the most commonly diagnosed behavioural disorders in children and young people. It is a complex and contested condition, with potential causes and treatments in biological, psychological and social domains. This is the first comprehensive text for nurses and other health professionals in this field. Nursing Children and Young People with ADHD explores the evidence, incorporating and expanding on the new NICE guidelines for practice in this area, to provide an essential knowledge base for practice. The text covers: causes, diagnosis, co-morbidity, user and carer perspectives, assessment, treatment and interventions (including those suitable for use in schools), prescribing and the legal background. An invaluable text for pre-registration student nurses on mental health and children branches, this will also be a useful reference work for post-registration nurses and health professionals seeking evidence-based recommendations for practice.

Are children and adolescents being silenced and their growth stunted in the age of quick diagnoses and overmedication? In The Silenced Child, Dr. Claudia Gold shows the tremendous power of listening in parent/child and doctor/patient relationships. Through vivid stories, perceptive insights, and new research, she shows the way children grow from these relationships and how being heard actually changes their brains. She helps both parents and caregivers make the time and space for listening. Praise for Keeping Your Child in Mind: "A very useful, thoughtful book. It lays out the best thinking of our time to help parents make decisions about nurturing their child's development." -- T. Berry Brazelton, MD, professor of Pediatrics, Emeritus Harvard Medical School

This book examines the phenomenon of medicalization and the increasingly large, invasive, and coercive role of medicine in society. Medicine today impinges territory formerly left to families, parents, society, and social and economic policy. Expanding disease definitions and allowing ever-milder conditions to qualify for medicine, ‘disease creep’, influences public policy and social behavior. Medicalization redirects those experiencing stress, sadness, or distraction to medicine, and impacts how society defines health and wellness. Medicalization in the contexts of diet, lifestyle, education and athletics, growing old, public safety, and mental and physical health, are all explored. Medicalization has adverse consequences both in that it may demonize those who do not go along, and it offers a false promise to remedy non-medical problems with a simple pill. The pharmaceutical industry profits from disease creep, and doctors are complicit in furthering a narrative that relies on medicine. Laws often support a medical approach to societal problems despite notable financial conflicts of interest. Written in a clear and accessible style, Medicalization is a valuable addition to the literature on bioethics, law, health policy, social sciences, and political studies.

Theoretical Alternatives to the Psychiatric Model of Mental Disorder Labeling is the fourth Volume of the Ethics International Press Critical Psychology and Critical Psychiatry Series. Understanding the current systems of psychology and psychiatry is profoundly important. So is exploring alternatives. The Critical Psychology and Critical Psychiatry Series presents solicited chapters from international experts on a wide variety of underexplored subjects. This is a series for mental health researchers, teachers, and practitioners, for parents and interested lay readers, and for anyone trying to make sense of anxiety, depression, and other emotional difficulties. Theoretical Alternatives recognizes and appreciates those who have contributed to the abundance of literature critiquing the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), the biomedical model of mental health, and the practice of psychiatric diagnosing. It intends to move past that discourse, and present macro and system-level alternatives to DSM and the ICD diagnosing (the World Health Organization’s International Statistical Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems), in the form of conceptually developed frameworks, taxonomies, and models to guide clinical work and theory.

In Helping Parents of Diagnosed, Distressed, and Different Children, Eric Maisel provides clinicians with the tools they need to address the issues facing the parents of diagnosed children. In these pages, mental health professionals will find tips for using the right language to guide families through situations such as sibling bullying and parental divorce, as well as guidelines for thinking critically about children’s mental health. Filled with hands-on resources including checklists and questionnaires, this valuable guide offers clinicians a set of strategies to help parents deal effectively with their child’s distress, regardless of the source.

A landmark publication in the field, this state of the art reference work includes contributions from leading thinkers across a range of disciplines on topics including ADHD, autism, depression, eating disorders and trauma. It is an essential resource for all those involved or interested in child mental health.