Cognitive Therapy for Depressed Adolescents

by Wilkes, T.C.R.; Belsher, Gayle; Rush, A. John; Frank, Ellen; and Associates; Beck, Aaron T.

• ISBN13: 9780898621198
• ISBN10: 0898621194
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1994-07-08
• Publisher: The Guilford Press

Summary

Based upon and adapted from Aaron T. Beck's cognitive therapy for depressed adults, this long-awaited volume provides general strategies and specific tactics for the use of cognitive therapy with depressed adolescents. Featuring strategies derived from years of clinical work and repeated testing, Cognitive Therapy for Depressed Adolescents provides patient-therapist narratives that convey a clinical feel for how this therapy works, as well as actual case vignettes illustrating effective techniques for diagnosis and treatment. Throughout, the book stresses that the approach be both interactive and educational.

The manual opens with a theoretical overview of cognitive therapy applications. Chapters present ten key principles of cognitive therapy with adolescents and techniques for assessing and diagnosing depression. Part II focuses on special issues that arise in the treatment of adolescents--developmental considerations, ways to create and sustain a therapeutic relationship, and how to involve the entire family in the adolescent's treatment.

Part III describes the macrostages and microtechniques in cognitive therapy with chapters presenting an in-depth analysis of goal setting, intervention, and termination. Part IV discusses comorbidity and strategies for working with substance-abusing teenagers, survivors of sexual victimization, and suicidal adolescents. Although the emphasis of this manual is on outpatient treatment, brief periods of hospitalization are often part of the management of depressed adolescents, so one chapter in Part V is devoted to the use of cognitive techniques in the inpatient setting, and another describes general management issues and psychopharmacological treatment. Finally, the chapter considers therapeutic failures and obstacles one encounters when working with this population.

Providing guidelines and principles of cognitive therapy techniques for the treatment of depressed adolescents, this volume will be of value to psychotherapists, psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, and counselors. These adapted techniques will also add to the repertoire of cognitive therapists who normally work with depressed adults but also encounter adolescents in their practice. Useful as a teaching text in courses that discuss new applications for cognitive therapy techniques, this book is also ideal supplemental reading in courses on psychology and psychotherapy.

Author Biography

T. C. R. Wilkes, M.D., is Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Director of the Psychiatric Residency Program at the University of Calgary, Alberta, and Medical Director of the Adolescent Program at Foothills Hospital in Calgary. He graduated in medicine at the University of Birmingham, England, and pursued training in pediatrics in Canada and the U.K. before completing his training in Edinburgh, Scotland and Dallas, Texas. He specializes in the manifestation of affective disorders in children and adolescents and is a member of the Canadian Child Academy.

A. John Rush, M.D., holds the Betty Jo Hay Distinguished Chair in Mental Health in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas. The author of over 100 articles, 40 chapters, and five books on the diagnosis and treatment of mood disorders, he is a Fellow of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology, the American College of Psychiatrists, and the American Psychiatric Association. Dr. Rush received the Strecker and the Charles C. Burlingame Awards for research and teaching in 1992.

Ellen Frank, Ph.D., is Professor of Psychiatry and Psychology at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and Director of the Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic's Depression and Manic-Depression Prevention Programs. Under grants from the national Institute of Mental Health, Dr. Frank is currently conducting a series of assessment and long-term maintenance treatment studies with individuals suffering from recurrent depression and another in the area of manic-depressive illness.

Gayle Belsher, PhD, is a staff psychologist on the Cognitive Therapy Team, Outpatient Mental Health Service of the Calgary Regional Health Authority consortium of hospitals. She is also an adjunct Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, University of Calgary. Her work on this book was completed during a postdoctoral fellowship sponsored by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

Table of Contents

Part I. Introduction and Overview. Rush, Nowels, Adaptation of Cognitive Therapy for Depressed Adolescents. Belsher, Wilkes, Ten Key Principles of Adolescent Cognitive Therapy. Emslie, Weinberg, Diagnosis and Assessment of Depression in Adolescents. Part II. Special Issues with Adolescent Patients. Wilkes, Developmental Considerations. Frank, Rush, The Therapeutic Relationship with Adolescents. Wilkes, Belsher, Family Involvement in the Adolescent's Cognitive Therapy. Part III. Macrostages and Microtechniques in Therapy. Wilkes, The Initial Phase of Cognitive Therapy: From Assessment to Setting Goals. Belsher, Wilkes, The Middle Phase of Cognitive Therapy: Intervention Techniques for Five Steps in the Therapeutic Process. Belsher, Wilkes, The Final Phases of Cognitive Therapy: Obstacles and Aids to Termination. Part IV. Comorbidity in Depressed Adolescents. Nowels, Cognitive Therapy with Depressed, Substance-Abusing Teenagers. Frank, Special Issues Related to Sexual Victimization. Brent, Lerner, Cognitive Therapy with Affectively Ill, Suicidal Adolescents. Part V. Other Treatments for Depressed Adolescents. Nowels, Cognitive Therapy with Hospitalized Adolescents. Emslie, Rush, Weinberg, General Management and Psychopharmacological Treatment of Depression in Adolescents. Part VI. Further Considerations. Rush, Wilkes, Belsher, Treatment Failures, Obstacles, and Options. Index.