Family Behavioral Issues in Health and Illness

A closer look at your patient’s family situation can help you develop a more effective treatment plan

Family Behavioral Issues in Health and Illness is a basic but thorough introduction to the impact family dynamics can have on a person’s health. Ideal as a supplemental training text for healthcare professionals, this unique book examines the connections between family and health, presenting a concise summary of family systems theory, basic family assessment, and the family life cycle. The book provides an understanding of how the patterns and systems found in a diverse range of family styles can create special health issues, and how the ability to assess and anticipate those issues can ensure the most comprehensive patient care and cost-effective management of time and resources.

As long as families continue to be the primary environment where patients learn and develop their beliefs and overall attitudes about life, it remains essential that any primary healthcare model includes a strong background in family dynamics and the critical, pivotal points of family life. Family Behavioral Issues in Health and Illness addresses the most important aspects of family to consider when providing care, presenting practical, real-life case studies that examine the resilience, strengths, and possibilities of families, as well as the problems and dysfunctions. The book looks at how significant events, such as marriage, divorce, birth, and death affect families, and how a knowledge of special family issues, including parenting, abuse, disability, and chronic illness prepares the healthcare professional to provide effective care for traditional, single-parent, multiracial, blended, adoptive, and same-gender families.

Family Behavioral Issues in Health and Illness examines:

• boundaries, roles, and rules
  
• triangulation
  
• subsystems
  
• scapegoating
  
• parentification
  
• healthy families
  
• the family genogram
  
• spiritual crises of family members
  
• infertility
  
• families without children
  
• intergenerational families
  
• the family in later life
  
• coping with alcoholism, dementia, bereavement, and/or mental illness
  
• and much more

Family Behavioral Issues in Health and Illness is an essential reference for healthcare professionals, educators, parents, and family members. The book provides a practical understanding of family relationships that helps healthcare providers guide patients toward a more complete well-being.