Non-Epileptic Seizures in Our Experience

The writers do not try to relay a 'How to treat...' manual for this disorder or sugarcoat any of the realities of treating this population. Overall, each story is a thoughtful and honest account of their experience. * Lindsay Morgan Higdon, MD, Thomas Jefferson University, Doody's Review Service *
Contributors to this book offer a collection of their experiences dealing with one of the most challenging populations in neuropsychiatric practice, individuals with PNES. In Our Experience assembles personal vignettes, windows into the mind and heart of professionals who feel deeply for their patients. Many clinicians comment on the great reward of abiding with our patients. Feedback from neurologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, and social workers I have trained in treating patients with PNES has been, 'This is some of the hardest work I do in clinic, but seeing patients get better over time, walking with them in their struggles and pain, is some of the most fulfilling work I do.' In this book, readers can see what touches and moves us as thoughtful and compassionate practitioners, as we care for patients with PNES." * W. Curt LaFrance, Jr., MD, MPH, Professor of Neurology and Psychiatry, Brown University, Director of Neuropsychiatry and Behavioral Neurology, Rhode Island Hospital *
So rarely are we, as healthcare professionals, encouraged to express the true and innermost emotional reactions and thoughts our patients elicit in us. Especially when it comes to patients diagnosed with PNES, asking a clinician to share this, is potentially a loaded exercise since these patients tend to be challenging to diagnose and treat and have been known to frustrate and stump many healthcare professionals. Non-Epileptic Seizures in Our Experience is a wonderful collection of personal accounts provided by professionals from across the globe who work with PNES and who boldly agreed to share with the readers their innermost, honest reflections. This is a must-read for professionals who treat PNES and for patients and loved ones to glimpse at the humanity and complexity of those 'specialists' whom you deal with daily." * Lorna Myers, PhD, Director of Psychogenic Nonepileptic Seizures Program, Northeast Regional Epilepsy Group, Author of Psychogenic Nonepileptic Seizures: A Guide *
This second book in a series devoted to Non-Epileptic Seizures explores, as the first, a common set of disorders from an angle rarely approached. It gives us the experiences, doubts, puzzlements, reflections on positive and negative thoughts and revelations of insight offered by those dealing with patients at a clinical level, from different settings. Like all confessions, the individual narratives allow us to contemplate our own wanderings through the difficult challenges to our understanding and prejudices of what sometimes seem like insoluble problems. How to avoid the Cartesian cataract and slipping into a mind-body split is something all contributors have in common and have to disentangle. None of us is too experienced to learn from others, and there is much here to discover." * Michael Trimble, MD, MPhil, Emeritus Professor of Neuropsychiatry, University College London *