Delusional Disorder: Paranoia and Related Illnesses

By Alistair Munro

Book Overview

Delusional disorder, once termed paranoia, was an important diagnosis in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and only in 1987 was it reintroduced into modern psychiatric diagnosis after being subsumed with schizophrenia. This book provides a comprehensive review of delusional disorder for psychiatrists and other clinicians. Beginning with the emergence of the concept of delusional disorder, the book goes on to detail its manifold presentations, differential diagnosis and treatment. Many instructive case histories are provided, illustrating manifestations of the various subtypes of delusional disorder, and related conditions in the paranoid spectrum. This is the most wide-ranging and authoritative text on the subject to have appeared for many years, and the first to suggest, based on the author's extensive experience, that the category of delusional disorder should contain not one but several conditions. It also emphasizes that, contrary to traditional belief, delusional disorder is a treatable illness.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 052158180X
• ISBN13: 9780521581806
• Release Date: April 1999
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Length: 276 Pages
• Weight: 1.15 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 6.2" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Excellent resourse on delusional disorder

My husband has delusional disorder and I have done a lot of research and reading to better understand his disorder. He fortunately has been seeing a psychiatrist for about a year now, but with no results. After reading this book, I now have some information I can discuss with the psychiatrist to help move forward in the treatment of my husband's disorder. This book is a very good resource for better understanding delusional disorder.

Thorough and enlightening but could be too clinical for a lay person

Clearly this is the work on the subject. It is a serious studious reference work. It is worth working through for anyone who has been touched by someone with this conditon.

Great description and classification but dehumanizing

Brilliant description and classification based on an exhaustive review of the literature and a lifetime of personal clinical experience and research is somewhat marred by the author's antidynamic stand along with the really cheap shots he takes at Freud and his tendency to ridicule almost anyone who suggests that we can understand delusions in the light of the patient's conflicts and concerns. Is it really plausible that erotomanic delusions are not related to a patient's sexuality, or that litigious delusions are not rooted in a patient's hostility? Does it seem likely that there is nothing to talk about with a patient who is convinced that her stretch marks will hamper her chances for marriage? To my way of thinking this is an unfortunate dehumanization of patients with a Delusional Disorder. Highly recommended, but mainly for those who are more interested in diagnosing than in treating Delusional Disorder using other than pharmacological methods.