Review

"Enormously practical, elegant in execution and delightfully fun to read, every page holds clinical wisdom . . . . I can think of no better first book for any trainee in mental health, for it is not only, in my opinion, an unsurpassed book about how to interview, it is a book about why we interview. It is a book that captures the wonderment of our work and the soul of our mission. . . . I have never seen such great teaching videos on eliciting suicidal ideation. They are a treasure, and I believe that many lives will be saved by those lucky enough to view them."

From the Foreword by Jan Fawcett, M.D.
Professor of Psychiatry, University of New Mexico
Recipient of Lifetime Achievement Awards
from both the American Association of Suicidology
and the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention

"Dr. Shea has done the impossible – written a text that works for bachelors, masters, and doctoral level social workers. Throughout the text, Shea integrates cultural humility, the client perspective, clinical wisdom, and the best that research has to offer. The accompanying videos are the most amazing instructional videos I’ve ever seen – they include mini-lectures, video of an actual client interview, and wondrously realistic role-plays (which invite you into the mind of a master) and speak directly to the content in the text. I hate to say it, but a medical doctor has written the best social work interviewing text on the market. I hope this text gets adopted in every school of social work."

Jonathan B Singer, Ph.D., LCSW
Associate Professor
School of Social Work, Loyola University Chicago
Founder and host, Social Work Podcast

"Insightful, wonderfully practical, and surprisingly comprehensive, Shea’s chapter on culturally sensitive interviewing in Psychiatric Interviewing: the Art of Understanding, 3^rd Edition sets a new bar on effective literature on multiculturalism. Shea not only eloquently delineates important cross-cultural principles for students - while modeling numerous immediately useful questions and strategies - he provides examples of clinician/client dialogue in which the student can actually see the interviewer gracefully transforming awkward cultural disconnects. I’ve never seen anything quite like it in the clinical literature. Simply superb! PS: Year after year my master level counseling students have raved - and I mean raved - about Shea’s textbook, and this Third Edition looks to be even better! I know of no book that better prepares a student for actual clinical practice."

Dottie R. Morris, Ph.D.
Chief Officer of Diversity and Multiculturalism, Keene State College
Former Director of Student Affairs for the Clinical Mental Health Counseling
Program at Antioch University New England

"Interviewing skills are not only indispensible, they are the rate-limiting factor in providing quality care. In the 3^rd Edition of Dr. Shea’s classic text, we now have an indispensable book to match the training needs of our psychiatric residents (indeed, of our trainees in any mental health discipline). The skills delineated within these chapters should, in my opinion, be taught in all psychiatric residency programs. Every resident should buy and read this entire book before taking his or her first night of call. Every resident. In fact, I recommend reading it twice. I almost forgot to mention, Shea’s extraordinary streaming videos will thrust this book to the forefront of web-based learning. Trust me on this point. They’re fabulous."

James L. Knoll, IV, M.D.
Professor of Psychiatry
Director of Forensic Psychiatry
SUNY Upstate Medical University

"Both of the previous editions of Dr. Shea’s book have anchored Bryn Mawr’s advanced clinical social work practice curriculum for a generation of our master’s degree students. This third edition is a masterful integration of text and video instruction. Indeed, it represents a pedagogical leap, in which Dr. Shea brings the beginning and advanced student into the mysteries of the first encounter with his characteristic warmth, compassion, and wisdom that has so enthralled our students over the years. Only now, we can see it, not only in engaging text, but in amazingly effective video instruction and interview demonstrations, that bring to life the clinical encounter. With the publication of this book, I personally believe that Dr. Shea has cemented his standing as one of the most influential mental health educators of the 21^st Century."

James A. Martin, Ph.D., LICSW
Colonel, U.S. Army (Retired)
Professor of Social Work and Social Research
Bryn Mawr College, Bryn Mawr, PA.

"We have been using the second edition of this book for over a decade at our school, and it has been an indispensable resource for both our faculty and our students. This 3^rd Edition has been revised and expanded including fascinating new chapters on topics such as wellness, motivational interviewing, cultural diversity and how to collaboratively talk with patients about their medications. Many of the chapters are enriched with engrossing video demonstrations. I can’t recommend this book enough. It will infuse passion and curiosity in your students. It will be a resource they will return to for learning for years to come."

Palmira Brouwer R.N. BscN, MA (psychology)
Faculty Department of Psychiatric Nursing
Douglas College, B.C. Canada

"Dr. Shea is an extremely gifted teacher, whose vibrant story-telling skills and compelling videos have led him to garnering some of the highest evaluations in the 30 year history of the Cape Cod Symposium. In short, readers are in for a rare treat when viewing the book’s video component."

Rob Guerette, M.D.
Founder and Director of the Cape Cod Symposium

"Here is a book I would enthusiastically recommend to all graduate students in psychology on the art of clinical interviewing and to all faculty who teach such courses. Even the most experienced clinician will enjoy and learn much from this text. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen an author capture the pain of patients dealing with serious disorders such as major depression, schizophrenia, and bipolar disorder with such sensitivity and compassion, while transforming this understanding into easily learned questions and techniques for use in actual practice. Combine this sensitive and comprehensive approach with Shea’s skillful use of advanced technology (over 7 hours of streaming video modules and interviewing demonstrations) and you have a book, whose shelf-life will be measured not in years, but decades."

Lawrence A. Welkowitz, Ph.D.
Co-Editor of Asperger’s Syndrome: Intervening in Clinics, Schools and Communities
Principle Investigator: Use of iPad Assisted Learning for Autism

"While reading the pages of this wonderful book, I kept wishing I could have held this book in my hands when I was a psychiatric resident. Dr. Shea’s stand-out chapters on personality dysfunction (from DSM-5 differential diagnosis to the effective application of object relations and self psychology) are suffused with an understanding of the pain experienced by patients with personality disorders, and the confusion and intensity they can stir-up in the interviewer. Using Shea’s techniques, clinicians will feel competent at steering through the most turbulent and treacherous of interpersonal eddies in order to connect with and help these patients. Readers of this highly engaging, ground-breaking book, and viewers of its over 7 hours of stunning videos, will be able to become the clinicians their patients deserve, the ones they were meant to be."

Laura Miller, M.D.
Medical Director of Women’s Mental Health
at Edward Hines Jr. VA Hospital
Professor of Psychiatry, Loyola University Stritch School of Medicine

"This edition retains all the elements responsible for the success of the earlier editions, yet is significantly expanded with ample new material in the print version, additional online material, and videos. This remains one of the premier books on the psychiatric interview."

Susan L. Glodstein, DNP, PMHNP, BC, PMHC, BC

Clinical Assistant Professor

Director of Continuing Education

Graduate Studies

School of Nursing, Stony Brook University

"Overflowing with practical interviewing techniques for sensitively uncovering accurate information from suicidal ideation and incest to nuanced DSM-5 diagnostic information. Written in a remarkably compelling and entertaining writing style. Accompanied by over seven hours of equally compelling streaming video of Dr. Shea demonstrating the techniques. Also, of particular note - every page of the text mirrors the great interpersonal approach of nurses such as Peplau and Nightingale. An extraordinarily rewarding must-read for any graduate nurse entering the field of psychiatry - should be mandatory reading for PMHNPs!"

Doody’s Book Review Score: 97/100 – 5 Stars!

Marina Bayeva, M.D., Ph.D.
Northwestern University
Feinberg School of Medicine

" Using a rich palette of information from various fields, including psychoanalysis, behavioral psychology, and sociology, the author writes about the entire interview, and reveals the rich interaction that begins even before the first words are spoken . . . . . It is no surprise that this book has been well received by major psychiatric journals. However, it is always a pleasant surprise to find an engaging book that is both theoretically sound and clinically indispensable."

Doody’s Book Reviewer

"This is a book I wish I could have written. . . . . can be read with interest by expert and novice alike."

Clinical Psychology Review
Arthur Weins, Ph.D.

"Rich in information, wisdom, humor, and charm, this book teaches not only interviewing skills but also the attitudes and behaviors that underpin the therapeutic personality and process."

American Journal of Psychiatry

"Provides a well-balanced synthesis of many approaches from various schools of psychiatry, psychology, and counseling . . . . enjoyable and stimulating to read. . . . . written with eloquence and humor."

British Journal of Psychiatry

"Intensely practical, with a riveting chapter on the assessment of risk for suicide and homicide. . . . . Reviewers have a way of telling you that a good book is essential for every psychiatric library. This time it really is true."

Canadian Journal of Psychiatry

"Shea’s book, which is now in its second edition, is a valuable counter-weight to the ‘one size fits all’ approach to interviewing and eliciting data. It is an invaluable book for those training in psychiatry or other mental health professions and indeed for practicing clinicians."

Australian and New Zealand Journal of Psychiatry

"Rich with sensitive observations and practical suggestions and enlivened by frequent examples of diagnostic interviewing."

Transactional Analysis Journal

"A marvelous text on an aspect of psychiatry that often does not receive as much attention as it deserves."

Hospital and Community Psychiatry