First published in 1989, Epidemiology and the Prevention of Mental Disorders examines the research undertaken into the methods for studying the occurrence of mental illness in populations during the twenty years prior to publication. The book explores the incidence and distribution of conditions such as schizophrenia, depression, alcoholism, addiction, and dementia across populations, and the risk factors with which they are associated. Taking a public health approach to the prevention of mental illness, the book reports on epidemiological research in psychiatry, emphasising its use in preventative terms, and making connections between its use in psychiatry and its use in other fields of medicine. It also comments on the development of psychiatric epidemiology as a public health discipline and draws attention to the implications of contemporary changes to biological and social environments on mental health. Epidemiology and the Prevention of Mental Disorders will appeal to those with an interest in the history of psychiatric epidemiology and mental health.

First published in 1989, Epidemiology and the Prevention of Mental Disorders examines the research undertaken into the methods for studying the occurrence of mental illness in populations during the twenty years prior to publication. The book explores the incidence and distribution of conditions such as schizophrenia, depression, alcoholism, addiction, and dementia across populations, and the risk factors with which they are associated. Taking a public health approach to the prevention of mental illness, the book reports on epidemiological research in psychiatry, emphasising its use in preventative terms, and making connections between its use in psychiatry and its use in other fields of medicine. It also comments on the development of psychiatric epidemiology as a public health discipline and draws attention to the implications of contemporary changes to biological and social environments on mental health. Epidemiology and the Prevention of Mental Disorders will appeal to those with an interest in the history of psychiatric epidemiology and mental health.

Searching for the causes of mental disorders is as exciting as it it complex. The relationship between pathophysiology and its overt manifestations is exceedingly intricate, and often the causes of a disorder are elusive at best. This book is an invaluable resource for anyone trying to track these causes, whether they be clinical researchers, public health practitioners, or psychiatric epidemiologists-in-training. Uniting theory and practice in very clear language, it makes a wonderful contribution to both epidemiologic and psychiatric research. Rather than attempting to review the descriptive epidemiology of mental disorders, this book gives much more dynamic exposition of the thinking and techniques used to establish it. Starting out by tracing the brief history of psychiatric epidemiology, the book describes the study of risk factors as causes of mental disorders. Subsequent sections discuss approaches to investigation of biologic, genetic, or social causes and the statistical analysis of study results. The book concludes by following some of the problems involved in the search for genetic causes of mental disorders, and more complex casual relationships.

Epidemiology has been defined as the study of the distribution and determinants of health states or events in defined populations and its application to the control of health problems. Psychiatric epidemiology has continued to develop and apply these core principles in relation to mental health and mental disorders. This long-awaited second edition of Practical Psychiatric Epidemiology covers all of the considerable new developments in psychiatric epidemiology that have occurred since the first edition was published. It includes new content on key topics such as life course epidemiology, gene/environment interactions, bioethics, patient and public involvement in research, mixed methods research, new statistical methods, case registers, policy, and implementation. Looking to the future of this rapidly evolving scientific discipline and how it will to respond to the emerging opportunities and challenges posed by 'big data', new technologies, open science and globalisation, this new edition will continue to serve as an invaluable reference for clinicians in practice and in training. It will also be of interest to researchers in mental health and people studying or teaching psychiatric epidemiology at undergraduate or postgraduate level.

The new edition of this critically praised textbook continues to provide the most comprehensive overview of the concepts, methods, and research advances in the field; particularly the application of molecular genomics and of neuroimaging. It has been revised and enhanced to capitalize on the strengths of the first and second editions while keeping it up-to-date with the field of psychiatry and epidemiology. This comprehensive publication now includes chapters on experimental epidemiology, gene-environment interactions, the use of case registries, eating disorders, suicide, childhood disorders and immigrant populations, and the epidemiology of a number of childhood disorders. As in the first and second editions, the objective is to provide a comprehensive, easy to understand overview of research methods for the non-specialist. The book is ideal for students of psychiatric epidemiology, psychiatric residents, general psychiatrists, and other mental health professionals. The book features a new editor, Peter Jones, from the University of Cambridge, who joins the successful US team of Ming Tsuang and Mauricio Tohen.

In the years prior to publication, primary health care had been gaining in significance as a setting both for research on mental illness in the general population and for the development of new preventive approaches in this field. The growing need for research had received impetus from the escalating costs of hospital-based health care, the re-structuring of health services in a number of countries, with an increased emphasis on community care and prevention, and the World Health Organization’s ‘Health for All’ campaign, in response to which a growing number of national planning documents had been published. These developments had already stimulated a new interest in the scope for epidemiological and evaluative investigations based on general medical practice. This book, originally published in 1992, consists of selected contributions to the first international scientific meeting on this topic, held in Toronto in 1989. It is made up of five sections, dealing respectively with: the growth and development of a new research field; findings of psychiatric surveys in general practice in a number of different countries; specialist and generalist medical care for mental illness – issues of selection and referral; and specialist aspects of late-life mental disorders encountered in such research. The inclusion of reports from groups of workers in the USA, the UK, the Netherlands, Germany, Spain, Italy, Finland, Canada, Australia and other countries testifies to the rapid spread of interest in these questions. With the exception of the first two chapters, which sketch the background of public-health and general-practice epidemiology, all the contributions are focused on general practice as a field laboratory for study of the occurrence, distribution, diagnostic composition and risk factors of psychiatric illness in unselected populations, and present data, largely unpublished, from the authors’ own projects. These findings confirm the importance of research in general practice as a major growing-point of social psychiatry and provide guidelines for further progress in the years ahead. This book will still be an invaluable source of reference to all psychiatrists, psychologists, general practitioners and health care professionals concerned with mental disorders in the wider community.