The Somatizing Child

In the spring of 1982, we began our collaboration while on sabbatical in Jerusa lem. Working together at Hadassah Medical Center, we discovered that we had overlapping and complementary interests. The wonderful surroundings com bined with a warm friendship nourished the development of this book. E. G. S:s interest in neuropsychology, cognitive function, and diagnostic clas sification and A. A R:s interest in the development of normal sexual behavior, incest and its consequences for psychopathology, and psychoanalytic thought provided a broad perspective on the field of somatoform disorders. For E. G. S. , Lawrence A. Lockman, a faculty member in pediatric neurology at the Univer sity of Minnesota who has a great interest in these cases, was particularly helpful. Many of the ideas on case management came from his admonitions to the house staff on rounds regarding proper management of patients and families. When we began to write the book in the fall of 1984, two students of E. G. S:s became involved. Norman Cohen, then a post doc, was very interested in pain and biofeedback, having worked extensively in the Pain Clinic at the University of Minnesota Hospitals. He was seeing many of the children in the clinic who required biofeedback and was especially interested in those with headache. He agreed to write the chapter on headache.

Contenu
1 Introduction.- 2 An Historic Overview of the Idea of Hysteria.- 3 Somatoform Disorders in Adults: Diagnosis and Predisposition.- Criteria for Diagnosis and Psychodynamic Factors in Somatoform Disorders.- Neurobiological Factors in Somatoform Disorders.- Problems in the Diagnosis of Somatoform Symptoms.- 4 Conversion and Somatization Disorders in Children: Review of the Literature.- Incidence.- Diagnostic Criteria.- Continuum of Severity.- Follow-up.- Associated Symptoms.- Psychological and Psychodynamic Characteristics.- Parental Characteristics.- Management and Treatment.- 5 A Spectrum of Conversion and Somatization Disorders in Children.- Etiologic Factors.- Characteristics of Children and Their Families.- Demographic Factors.- The Spectrum of Somatoform Disorders.- 6 Principles of Diagnosis.- Interview with the Child.- Interview with the Parents.- Psychological Evaluation.- Cognitive Assessment.- Personality Assessment.- Sexual Abuse and the Diagnostic Evaluation.- Feedback Conferences.- 7 Principles of Clinical Intervention.- Outpatient Management.- Management on a Pediatric Ward.- Psychotherapy.- Psychiatric Hospitalization and Other More Intensive Treatment.- 8 Headache in Children: Diagnosis and Treatment.- Definitions of Headache.- Differential Diagnosis.- Epidemiology of Childhood Headache.- Prognosis of Childhood Headache.- Treatment of Pediatric Headache.- Summary.- 9 Pseudoseizures in Children and Adolescents.- Epidemiology and Symptom Description.- Subtypes of Pseudoseizures.- Pseudoseizures and Epileptic Seizures: Diagnosis.- Etiologic Factors.- Treatment.- Conclusions.- 10 Conclusions.- Author Index.