Hidden Addictions

Assessment Practices for Psychotherapists, Counselors, and Health Care Providers

By (author) Marilyn Freimuth

Publication date:

14 July 2005

Length of book:

288 pages

Publisher

Jason Aronson, Inc.

ISBN-13: 9780765700797

Media portrayals and diagnostic criteria convey an image of an addicted person as someone whose deficient coping skills and severely compromised functioning are readily apparent. Yet addictions remain some of the most frequently missed diagnoses in health and mental health care settings. This occurs, in large part, because most people with addictions do not fit the stereotype. In the context of psychotherapy, the typical patient with an addiction will present depression, anxiety, marital problems or a general sense that life is not working. This book addresses how addictions can be recognized more often and accurately assessed in the context of psychotherapy. Along with learning about the standard assessment instruments, the reader is introduced to methods for asking the appropriate questions and listening to the clinical dialogue for signs of a undisclosed addiction. This book provides a great deal of knowledge about addictions and their assessment in a way that is relevant to clinical practice.

Chapter 1 What qualifies as an Addiction
Chapter 2 Lessons Learned From a Brief History of Addiction Treatment
Chapter 3 The Need For Addiction Assessment in Health Care Settings
Chapter 4 Impediments to Accurate Addiction Assessment
Chapter 5 Standardized Approaches to Substance Based Addictions Assessment
Chapter 6 Assessment of Process Addictions
Chapter 7 Clinical Interview Based Approaches to Assessment
Chapter 8 Addiction Assessment with Diverse Populations
Chapter 9 The Nature of the Addiction: A Further Source of Camouflage
Chapter 10 Transforming the Assessment Process into Treatment
Chapter 11 Assessing Hidden Addictions in Psychotherapy: Case Illustrations
Chapter 12 Autobiographies of Addiction

This book is as academic as a serious textbook needs to be but it is also very readable, practical and persuasive. Psychotherapists reading this book are sure to realize that addressing addictions is certainly their role and that they have many of the skills that addiction specialists use to loosen or eradicate addictive behaviours. Marilyn Freimuth provides much of the additional information that is needed to uncover these behaviours, to screen for abuse and dependence and to expand the psychotherapeutic process to deal with them.The book should move a pre-contemplative psychotherapist through contemplation to action with just one bound; but why only psychotherapists? This book should have a wider readership. Uncovering and dealing with hidden addictions would improve the practice of most health professionals and social workers.