Creating Competence from Chaos (Norton Professional Books)

$38.00

Account Type

Format

Quantity

Author: Martha Morrison Dore Ph. D.

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Hardcover:
ISBN 10: 0393702642
ISBN 13: 978-0393702644

Children with emotional and behavioral disorders are often adrift in our society, lacking adequate mental health care or caught between several child-serving systems, such as child welfare, juvenile justice, and the schools.

In Pennsylvania, a commitment has been made, on a statewide basis, to serve these children and strengthen their vulnerable families through a home-based approach grounded in ecosystemic thinking and practice. This book tells the story of Pennsylvania's evolving treatment program, providing a model for other professionals who believe that a family's needs are best met through individually tailored, family-centered, community-based, culturally competent, and outcome-oriented services.

This is a complete, comprehensive guide, covering everything from planning and development of home-based services through supervision and training of home-based practitioners and evaluation of treatment outcomes. Particular attention is given to the clinical challenges faced by home-based therapists working with families where children are depressed and perhaps suicidal, oppositional and defiant, out-of-control and aggressive, or hyperactive/impulsive. These families commonly have multiple problems, complex histories, and a negative view of outside "helpers."

Delivered in the family's home and involving parents as partners, the services described here work to improve child and family functioning through family therapy, creation of collaborative links between appropriate community and family resources, and provision of family support funds for concrete services such as transportation, respite care, and emergencies. Home-based treatment serves both children at risk for out-of-home placement due to a diagnosis of severe mental illness or behavioral disorders and children being discharged from inpatient hospitals and psychiatric residential placements.

The authors, active at every level of program conceptualization and implementation, share their wealth of experience with readers. Their advice and case studies move from the big picture to the small details of where to sit in a family's home, what to say, and how to think about a problematic situation. Several appendices of forms used for assessment, evaluation, and training add to the book's practical value. Theoretically sound and fully practical, this guide to home-based services will encourage all professionals serving children to involve their families and communities-and to meet them where they live.

Review

Creating Competence from Chaos is a pathbreaking book for practitioners and parents who've sat on the hard benches of a juvenile court and wondered whether there might be another way--a more effective way--to help children with serious emotional disorders. Lindblad-Goldberg, Dore, and Stern describe from A to Z the development of home-based mental health services in Pennsylvania. Filled with anecdotes, case histories, humorous snippets, treatment theory, and program description, this is a how-to book for system reformers, child advocates, concerned practitioners, and families who won't accept the status quo. It's compelling reading, a case history extraordinaire. -- Mark W. Fraser, Ph.D., John A. Tate Distinguished Professor for Children in Need, School of Social Work, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Describing aspects of providing home-based services from the administration, funding, training, and supervision to theoretical foundations and clinical applications, this richly illustrated book is an excellent resources. It should be a reference for all professionals who work with children and an essential text for those who provide home-based care. -- Lee Combrinck-Graham, M.D, child and adolescent psychiatrist, mental health systems consultant, Stamford, Connecticut

This book about home-based services is written from the perspective of three disciplines--policy-making, clinical services, and research. Such a combined perspective is clearly necessary to establish the context for successful home-based interventions and to present research findings concerning the effects. Reading this book is like opening one of those fertile Russian nesting dolls. As soon as one finishes examining an issue, such as the organization of agencies, a new one is revealed, such as the network of community providers, and then another, such as the theory of family functioning. Even when we get to the smallest details about the training of home-based staff and the supervision and organization of treatment teams, we understand how they are interconnected and fit within the big picture. The authors never forget the complexity of delivering home-based services while giving detailed, practical guidance to practitioners and administrators. -- Salvador Minuchin, M.D., author of Mastering Family Therapy: Journeys of Growth and Transformation

This wonderful volume takes a huge step toward specifying competence in a field that has tremendous potential but is often chaotic. I highly recommend this pragmatic and insightful text to practitioners and administrators alike. -- Scott W. Henggeler, Ph.D. Professor and Director of Family Services Research Center, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston

About the Author

Martha Morrison Dore, Ph.D., is associate professor at Columbia University School of Social Work in New York. She was formerly Director of Social Work Research at the Philadelphia Child Guidance Center and adjunct assistant professor of social work in psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania.

Marion Lindblad-Goldberg, Ph.D., is clinical associate professor of psychology, department of psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine in Philadelphia. She is also Director of the Family Therapy Training Center, Philadelphia Child Guidance Center of the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

Lenora Stern is Chief, Division of Research and Program Development, State Office of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Filters

Martha Morrison Dore Ph. D.

Creating Competence from Chaos (Norton Professional Books)