Rauch and McLean bridge the gap between neuroscience research and the treatment of PTSD patients. Individuals with PTSD have developed automatic associations between specific stimuli and traumatic events. As a result, these individuals experience intense fear when exposed to the stimuli, even though the original threat is no longer present. This book presents prolonged exposure therapy (PE), a specific manualized exposure therapy program for PTSD. A variant of exposure therapy, PE is a cognitive behavioral approach designed to reduce pathological anxiety and related emotions by helping patients approach relatively safe but distress-provoking thoughts, memories, situations, and stimuli, with the goal of reducing unhelpful emotional reactions to those stimuli. Informed by extensive research but written for clinicians, the book explains how neuroscience can guide our application of the three key components of PE: (1) psychoeducation about the nature of trauma, (2) in vivo exposure to trauma reminders, and (3) imaginal exposure to the memory of the traumatic event followed by processing of the imaginal and other exposures. Reviews: Rapid advances in technology have spurred a massive movement in recent years to understand the role of neuroscience in the etiology, perpetuation, and treatment of PTSD. This book provides an excellent summary of what’s being done to augment the already powerful efficacy of prolonged exposure therapy. — Simon A. Rego, PsyD, ABPP, A-CBT, Chief of Psychology, Montefiore Medical Center, Associate Professor, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, NY, January 2021 Rauch and McLean provide a clear understanding of the psychological and neurological processes involved in effective PTSD treatment. They do not attempt to make clinicians neuroscience experts nor make neuroscientists clinicians but, they translate how we must integrate psychology and neuroscience to advance PTSD treatment. — Nancy C. Bernardy, PhD, Associate Professor, Geisel School of Medicine, Hanover, NH; Clinical Psychologist, National Center for PTSD, White River Junction, VT, January 2021 This text “begins at the beginning,” with a wonderful explanation of learning and cognitive theory that grounds readers in the core and basic assumptions upon which most effective, evidence-based psychotherapies for posttraumatic stress disorder are built. The book then moves quickly to the heart of the ways we retrain the brain, weaving evidence and explanation in a way that compels the reader to dig deeper. I have rarely seen texts that bring to bear findings from endocrine, neurochemistry, imaging, genetics, and psychophysiology to paint the whole picture of PTSD. These chapters alone are worth the price of admission, but practitioners will be particularly pleased with the final sections of the book, which show that the authors are, in fact, clinician scientists and which clearly present the best-practices treatments we have, as well as how these treatments are being modified and augmented to achieve even greater improvements in clinical functioning. This book will be an excellent reference for researchers, clinicians, and students of the field. — Ron Acierno, PhD, Director, Trauma and Resilience Center; Vice Chair for Veterans Affairs; Professor, Louis Faillace Department of Psychiatry, McGovern Medical School at UT Health, Houston, TX, January 2021 Retraining the Brain should be on the bookshelf of every clinician who treats PTSD, every graduate student who wants to treat PTSD, and every stress neuroscientist who strives to keep their work clinically relevant. — Barbara O. Rothbaum, PhD, ABPP, Professor in Psychiatry; Director, Veterans Program and Trauma and Anxiety Recovery Program; Paul A. Janssen Chair in Neuropsychopharmacology; Associate Vice Chair of Clinical Research, Emory University School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA, January 2021 A valuable resource that will improve therapy and recovery rates, this book explains the role of various brain processes on PTSD treatment. Most importantly, it is written in a way that is easy for clinicians who are not neuroscientists to follow. — Sonya Norman, PhD, National Center for PTSD and University of California San Diego, School of Medicine, La Jolla, CA, United States, February 2021 About the Authors: Sheila A. M. Rauch, PhD, ABPP, is a professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Emory University School of Medicine and serves as deputy director of the Emory Healthcare Veterans Program and director of mental health research and program evaluation at the VA Atlanta Healthcare System. She has been developing programs, conducting research, and providing treatment for PTSD and anxiety disorders for over 20 years. She has published scholarly articles, chapters, and books on anxiety disorders and PTSD, focusing on neurobiology and factors involved in the development, maintenance, and treatment of anxiety disorders. Carmen P. McLean, PhD, is a clinical psychologist at the National Center for PTSD’s Dissemination and Training Division at the Palo Alto VA and a clinical associate professor (affiliate) at Stanford University. She’s an associate editor for Cognitive Behavioral Practice and a 2018 recipient of the Anne Marie Albano Early Career Award for Excellence in the Integration of Science and Practice from the Association for Cognitive and Behavioral Therapies. She’s published over 100 articles and chapters on PTSD and anxiety. Her research examines ways to increase the reach of exposure therapy for PTSD by addressing implementation barriers and testing eHealth interventions.
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