Barber articulately and persuasively counsels that it’s time to abandon the quick-fix, pop-a-pill approach.
A sharply critical look at the way antidepressants are marketed and prescribed in the United States.
While the mentally ill aren’t receiving the treatment they need, Americans with ordinary life problems are being overmedicated, writes Barber (Psychiatry/Yale School of Medicine; Songs from the Black Chair: A Memoir of Mental Interiors, 2005). Though not a psychiatrist, he has a decade of professional experience working with mentally ill homeless people. He severely criticizes the pharmaceutical industry but places much of the blame on the medical profession, charging that at a time when the understanding of psychiatric drugs remains crude, doctors are too willing to prescribe the pills that patients request after seeing them advertised on television. The author divides the book into two parts. The first provides a capsule history of psychiatry in the United States and examines the shortcomings of the currently ascendant biological, or neuropsychiatric, approach. Barber attacks with shocking statistics (in 2006, 227 million antidepressant prescriptions were dispensed to Americans, up by 30 million from the 2002 levels) and punchy prose: “Psychiatry [is] jettisoning the impoverished mentally ill for the cash-carrying worried well.” He reserves particular mockery for the American Psychiatric Association’s diagnostic manual, citing its recent introduction of Motivational Deficiency Disorder as a nonsensical medicalization of laziness. Part Two advocates the use of an alternative, cognitive-behavioral therapy. The author spells out details of two related treatment approaches: the Stages of Change model, which recognizes that change is a dynamic process in which relapse is a realistic part of a continuum; and Motivational Interviewing, in which the therapist uses a technique of empathetic listening that centers on the client’s ambivalence about change.
Barber articulately and persuasively counsels that it’s time to abandon the quick-fix, pop-a-pill approach.Pub Date: Feb. 5, 2008
ISBN: 978-0-375-42399-4
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Pantheon
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2007
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.
Pub Date: Feb. 23, 1955
ISBN: 0670717797
Page Count: -
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Oct. 25, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 1955
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