Biopsychosocial Practice: A Science-Based Framework for Behavioral Health Care

Throughout the history of mental health practice, conflicting and irreconcilable theories have caused confusion about how disorders form, what they look like, and how they should be assessed and treated. But dramatic scientific advances in recent years have shed light on the scientific processes that underlie and connect body and mind. As a result, the patchwork theoretical orientations of the past can now be replaced by a unified, science-based, biopsychosocial framework for understanding human development, functioning, and behavior change. In this book, Timothy Melchert presents a comprehensive biopsychosocial framework for behavioral health care. He lays out the essential scientific and ethical foundations of the framework and then applies it across the treatment process, from intake through outcome assessment. In doing so, Melchert provides a critical basis for the integrated health care systems of the 21st century. This book is appropriate for all mental health practitioners treating all types of patients, at all levels of functioning, in general as well as specialized practice.