Schizophrenia and Psychoses in Later Life: New Perspectives on Treatment, Research, and Policy

Description

By 2050, the number of people aged sixty years and older with schizophrenia is expected to double and affect about 10 million people worldwide. Psychoses are among the most common experiences in later life, with a lifetime risk of 23 percent. As a result, there is a looming crisis in mental health care. Schizophrenia and Psychoses in Later Life is the first major multidisciplinary reference on these important disorders. The book provides guidelines for clinical care, research and policy that are consistent with the emerging paradigmatic changes occurring with respect to schizophrenia in later life. This book features multidisciplinary contributions from experts in the fields of biological psychiatry, social psychiatry, sociology, anthropology, social work, psychology, and neuropsychology that will help professionals to integrate services and attain the best outcomes. The text will guide psychiatrists, psychologists, gerontologists, policymakers, and social scientists in creating innovative new programs to help this underserved and growing population.

Carl I. Cohen is SUNY Distinguished Service Professor and Director, Division of Geriatric Psychiatry at State University of New York Downstate Medical Center. He is also the founding director of the Brooklyn Alzheimer's Disease Assistance Center and the Geriatric Psychiatry Fellowship Program. He has authored over 200 articles and three books on topics in mental illness and aging. Paul D. Meesters is a geriatric psychiatrist and tutor in geriatric psychiatry at Friesland Mental Health Services, Leeuwarden, the Netherlands. He has authored over twenty articles and co-edited a book on Neuropsychiatry.

'This book is a unique compendium of the major studies of aging and schizophrenia. In this way, it provides an essential resource for current understanding of the issues involved. The effort itself involves an important and often neglected area of the mental health field. The book covers the two crucial general areas, the nature of the problem of schizophrenia in later life, and the variety of programs possible for its treatment. ... This broad-reaching review reminds care-givers, clinicians, researchers, and community activists of the diversity of 'treatments' that need to be considered and evaluated for more intelligent approaches to care.' John Strauss, Yale University, Connecticut