Helping Traumatized Families

Charles R. Figley is the Paul Henry Kurzweg Distinguished Chair in Disaster Mental Health at Tulane U and a Vietnam veteran (Sgt, US Marines). Three years before the term "PTSD" was coined, he wrote the first edition of this book on helping families survive and recover from trauma. It quickly became a standard text. This edition is the first full revision since then; Laurel J. Kiser (U. of Maryland School of Medicine) has been brought on as co-author to help update the work. In many ways, the fact that the core of this text was published in 1989 is a strength; Figley wrote in a field lacking jargon, pop-psychology, or professional inertia, and was therefore forced to think through his ideas very clearly, support them with the weight of practical experience, and write them down in common language. The book is therefore a good resource for a wide range of clinicians in practice and students in mental health, social work, or medicine. Its style is a model for helping clinicians understand how to talk about these issues clearly and humanely in plain language. It will be equally useful to individuals and families coping with trauma who would like a book to help them understand their experience, and are comfortable using a book that is also designed for counselors. The update brings in material from more recent literature and findings, as well as making sure the text fully reflects that both parents in a nuclear family are now likely to have major job responsibilities outside the home. Annotation c2013 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Charles R. Figley, PhD, is the Paul Henry Kurzweg Distinguished Chair at Tulane University. A former Marine sergeant who served early in the Vietnam War, he went on to help pioneer the modern study of trauma and many innovations in helping the traumatized, including practitioners themselves, in his more than 200 scholarly articles, chapters, and books.

Laurel J. Kiser, PhD, MBA, is an associate professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine and heads the Family Informed Trauma Treatment Center (FITT). She has been supported by NIMH and SAMHSA to develop family-based trauma interventions including Strengthening Family Coping Resources (SFCR). Her articles appear frequently in the professional literature.