Craig L. Katz – författare

Disasters! Looking beyond their acute impact to how they affect communities in the years that follow is the focus of discussion in this issue of Psychiatric Clinics. Reviews of cases of well known disasters such as 9/11, the 2004 South Asian tsunami, Hurricane Katrina, the Haiti earthquake of 2010, the 3/11/11 "triple disaster" in Northern Japan, and others are presented from the perspective of local experts who have been asked to take a long view of what they learned and may still be learning from their post-disaster experiences that mental health professionals faced with future disasters should know. World renown experts in disaster psychiatry and global psychiatry, Craig Katz and Anand Pandya, lead this publication.

Spurred in part by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, which turned nearly all mental health professionals into de facto disaster mental health professionals—this second edition of Disaster Psychiatry remains a clinically oriented, evidence-based, and practical guide to mental health evaluation and interventions against the backdrop of adversity.

Disaster Psychiatry: Intervening When Nightmares Come True captures the state of disaster psychiatry in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. This emergent psychiatric specialty, which is increasingly separated from trauma and grief psychiatry on one hand and military psychiatry on the other, provides psychotherapeutic assistance to victims during, and in the weeks and months following, major disasters. As such, disaster psychiatrists must operate in the widely varying locales in which natural and man-made disasters occur, and they must establish their role among the chaotic array of organizations involved in direct disaster response. Editors Anand Pandya and Craig Katz have captured the challenge and promise of disaster psychiatry through first-person narratives. We hear from psychiatrists who have encountered disasters at various stages of their career and in widely varying social, political, and personal contexts. Accounts of psychiatric involvement with adults and children during and after 9/11 have understandable pride of place in this collection. But they are balanced by richly informative narratives about other domestic and international disasters. Fraught with the drama attendant to the events they describe, these essays delineate the dizzying array of challenges that confront the disaster psychiatrist. They range from the intense emotional responses that are part of the aftermath of any disaster, to the need to legitimize a psychiatric presence within diverse cultural and medical contexts, to the subtle task of providing therapeutic boundaries at a time when all rules seem to be suspended. Special attention is given to the daunting task of working with children whose parents' are disaster victims. What emerges from these testimonies is compelling documentation of skilled and compassionate psychiatrists at the outer limits of their specialty, pursuing their calling into uncharted realms of therapeutic engagement.

Disaster Psychiatry: Intervening When Nightmares Come True captures the state of disaster psychiatry in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. This emergent psychiatric specialty, which is increasingly separated from trauma and grief psychiatry on one hand and military psychiatry on the other, provides psychotherapeutic assistance to victims during, and in the weeks and months following, major disasters. As such, disaster psychiatrists must operate in the widely varying locales in which natural and man-made disasters occur, and they must establish their role among the chaotic array of organizations involved in direct disaster response. Editors Anand Pandya and Craig Katz have captured the challenge and promise of disaster psychiatry through first-person narratives. We hear from psychiatrists who have encountered disasters at various stages of their career and in widely varying social, political, and personal contexts. Accounts of psychiatric involvement with adults and children during and after 9/11 have understandable pride of place in this collection. But they are balanced by richly informative narratives about other domestic and international disasters. Fraught with the drama attendant to the events they describe, these essays delineate the dizzying array of challenges that confront the disaster psychiatrist. They range from the intense emotional responses that are part of the aftermath of any disaster, to the need to legitimize a psychiatric presence within diverse cultural and medical contexts, to the subtle task of providing therapeutic boundaries at a time when all rules seem to be suspended. Special attention is given to the daunting task of working with children whose parents' are disaster victims. What emerges from these testimonies is compelling documentation of skilled and compassionate psychiatrists at the outer limits of their specialty, pursuing their calling into uncharted realms of therapeutic engagement.

Drawing on the authors’ experience in developing and implementing global mental health programs in crisis and development settings, A Guide to Global Mental Health Practice: Seeing the Unseen is designed for mental health, public health, and primary care professionals new to this emerging area.The guide is organized topically and divided into four sections that move from organizing and delivering global mental health services to clinical practice, and from various settings and populations likely to be encountered to special issues unique to global work. Case studies based around a central scene are threaded throughout the book to convey what global mental health work actually involves.Mental health professionals of all backgrounds, including social workers, nurses, nurse practitioners, psychologists, and psychiatrists, as well as public health professionals and community level medical professionals and mental health advocates will benefit from this engaging primer. It is the book for anyone committed to addressing mental health issues in a low resource or crisis-hit setting, whether international or domestic.

Drawing on the authors’ experience in developing and implementing global mental health programs in crisis and development settings, A Guide to Global Mental Health Practice: Seeing the Unseen is designed for mental health, public health, and primary care professionals new to this emerging area.The guide is organized topically and divided into four sections that move from organizing and delivering global mental health services to clinical practice, and from various settings and populations likely to be encountered to special issues unique to global work. Case studies based around a central scene are threaded throughout the book to convey what global mental health work actually involves.Mental health professionals of all backgrounds, including social workers, nurses, nurse practitioners, psychologists, and psychiatrists, as well as public health professionals and community level medical professionals and mental health advocates will benefit from this engaging primer. It is the book for anyone committed to addressing mental health issues in a low resource or crisis-hit setting, whether international or domestic.