"This compendium of nineteen essays offers a fascinating analysis of the psychology behind the long running sci-fi television show"--Back cover

How to Improve Doctor-Patient Connection offers actionable steps for improving communication between health professionals and patients based on visual, auditory, and emotional understanding from the principles of cognitive psychology. Drawing on the author’s personal experience as both a healthcare professional and a mother of two children, How to Improve Doctor-Patient Connection explores communication between doctors and patients as well as bias in healthcare. This how-to text includes several practical applications that can be applied to healthcare encounters, enabling readers to form habits based on visual analysis of body language, auditory information from language and tone of voice, and logical emotion perception that will allow for improved doctor-patient connection. By integrating the perspectives of both doctors and patients and applying a psychological lens, this text is invaluable to healthcare practitioners, students of medicine, healthcare, biology, and related fields, and anyone looking to improve their own or other’s quality of doctor-patient interactions and overall healthcare experience.

The problems faced by medical doctors and automobile mechanics are in some ways quite similar—something isn't working right and must be fixed. They must both figure out the cause of malfunctions and determine the appropriate treatments. Yet, the mechanic has no need to worry about an automobile's psyche; the specific mechanical factors are the only ones that come into play. In health care, however, the factors influencing outcomes are broader, more complicated, and colored by the underlying psychological factors of those involved. These factors have profound effects. Doctors are often influenced by patients' description of symptoms, yet information is often incomplete or inaccurate or colored by the patient's own experiences. The doctor's own demeanor may greatly affect outcomes, as can the doctor's ability to interpret the ever-expanding medical literature. These underlying influences are often not acknowledged, and yet they can have far-reaching consequences. Acknowledging these psychological factors and learning how to overcome them are the first steps in improving communications between doctors and patients and to improving diagnosis and treatment. Here, the authors offer strategies for remedying the situation and moving forward to a better understanding of doctor-patient visits and their outcomes.

As Doctor Who approaches its fiftieth anniversary recent series have taken the show to new heights in terms of popular appeal and critical acclaim.The Doctor and his TARDIS-driven adventures, along with companions and iconic monsters, are now recognised and enjoyed globally. The time is ripe for a detailed analytic assessment of this cultural phenomenon. Focussing on the most recent television output The Inner World of Doctor Who examines why the show continues to fascinate contemporary audiences. Presenting closely-observed psychoanalytic readings of selected episodes, this book examines why these stories of time travel, monsters, and complex human relationships have been successful in providing such an emotionally rich dramatization of human experience. The Inner World of Doctor Who seeks to explore the multiple cultural and emotional dimensions of the series, moving back and forth from behind the famous sofa, where children remember hiding from scary monsters, and onto the proverbial psychoanalytic couch.

A guide to ACT: the revolutionary mindfulness-based program for reducing stress, overcoming fear, and finding fulfilment – now updated. International bestseller, 'The Happiness Trap', has been published in over thirty countries and twenty-two languages. NOW UPDATED. Popular ideas about happiness are misleading, inaccurate, and are directly contributing to our current epidemic of stress, anxiety and depression. And unfortunately, popular psychological approaches are making it even worse! In this easy-to-read, practical and empowering self-help book, Dr Russ Harries, reveals how millions of people are unwittingly caught in the 'The Happiness Trap', where the more they strive for happiness the more they suffer in the long term. He then provides an effective means to escape through the insights and techniques of ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy), a groundbreaking new approach based on mindfulness skills. By clarifying your values and developing mindfulness (a technique for living fully in the present moment), ACT helps you escape the happiness trap and find true satisfaction in life. Mindfulness skills are easy to learn and will rapidly and effectively help you to reduce stress, enhance performance, manage emotions, improve health, increase vitality, and generally change your life for the better. The book provides scientifically proven techniques to: reduce stress and worry; rise above fear, doubt and insecurity; handle painful thoughts and feelings far more effectively; break self-defeating habits; improve performance and find fulfilment in your work; build more satisfying relationships; and, create a rich, full and meaningful life.

In this stirring and beautifully written wake-up call, psychiatrist Daniel Carlat writes with bracing honesty about how psychiatry has so largely forsaken the practice of talk therapy for the seductive—and more lucrative—practice of simply prescribing drugs, with a host of deeply troubling consequences. Psychiatrist Daniel Carlat has noticed a pattern plaguing his profession. Psychiatrists have settled for treating symptoms rather than causes, embracing the apparent medical rigor of DSM diagnoses and prescription in place of learning the more challenging craft of therapeutic counseling, gaining only limited understanding of their patients’ lives. Talk therapy takes time, whereas the fifteen-minute "med check" allows for more patients and more insurance company reimbursement. Yet, DSM diagnoses, he shows, are premised on a good deal less science than we would think. Writing from an insider’s perspective, with refreshing forthrightness about his own daily struggles as a practitioner, Dr. Carlat shares a wealth of stories from his own practice and those of others that demonstrate the glaring shortcomings of the standard fifteen-minute patient visit. He also reveals the dangers of rampant diagnoses of bipolar disorder, ADHD, and other "popular" psychiatric disorders, and exposes the risks of the cocktails of medications so many patients are put on. Especially disturbing are the terrible consequences of overprescription of drugs to children of ever younger ages. Taking us on a tour of the world of pharmaceutical marketing, he also reveals the inner workings of collusion between psychiatrists and drug companies. Concluding with a road map for exactly how the profession should be reformed, Unhinged is vital reading for all those in treatment or considering it, as well as a stirring call to action for the large community of psychiatrists themselves. As physicians and drug companies continue to work together in disquieting and harmful ways, and as diagnoses—and misdiagnoses—of mental disorders skyrocket, it’s essential that Dr. Carlat’s bold call for reform is heeded.