Best Forensic and C&A Psych Books

[TexasPhysician]

I saw the sticky above, but it is a huge general list of psych books. I'm lacking a good forensics book and a good C&A book to complete my 2nd year book collection.

What is the single best forensics book that hopefully includes sample evaluations?

What is the go-to book in C&A? I've seen Kaplan has one, and Duncan as well. Who is the authority here and who is most up-to-date?

Thanks for the help. The advice I received here for the Kaufman neuro text was excellent. I appreciate the advice.

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[whopper]

Give me a day to scrounge through my books. There's a lot of books that are terrible.

 

[TexasPhysician]

Give me a day to scrounge through my books. There's a lot of books that are terrible.

I would greatly appreciate it. There are numerous books on Amazon on these subjects with very few reviews.

 

[TexasPhysician]

Bump. There have got to at least be other PGY-2s using a book fund around here.

 

[whopper]

http://www.amazon.com/Psychological...9660/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1319510689&sr=8-1

http://www.google.com/products/cata...7&sa=X&ei=gCKmTukHjeqBB-3rzQw&ved=0CFIQ8wIwAA

There's two main types of books in forensic psychiatry. A forensic psychiatry book for a general psychiatrist who isn't going to do much in-depth forensic work at all, but wants a taste of it so that if he's sued for malpractice or something to that effect, he at least has some knowledge. Such books usually only emphasize things that are relevant for a general psychiatrist.

If you want to go into forensic psychiatry, the above type of book is useless because in a few months of fellowship you'll be light-years ahead of such a book and you likely could've written a book on the same level of quality if not better.

The second category is a forensic psychiatry text that even someone skilled in this area will want to reference and read from time-to-time. This is the type of book you want if you actually want to go into the field.

Out of the two categories, the majority of books in forensic psychiatry that I've seen fit the first.

Melton's book is considered the best by many. There is an error in it that was pointed out in the Amazon review, but despite that, I still believe it's one of the best if not the best. This opinion has been shared with several that I consider way beyond me in skill and experience that are literally the top people in the field. It's easy to read, in-depth, and well done. Another book that several people like is Rossner's book, but it was last published 2003.

 

[TexasPhysician]

What would be the best for someone going into forensic work? Thanks for your help.

 

[whopper]

My opinion would be the Melton book and I provided links. Another reason why I found it superior to other books is it gives more depth in the actual practice of writing reports that is the bread and butter of a court evaluation.

If you go into a fellowship, they'll likely pay for the book.

 

[Chimed]

Hi,

There is, unfortunately, no one great child psych book that I'm aware of. They all have advantages and disadvantages. I had been using the Dulcan book, which is pretty readable. http://www.amazon.com/Dulcans-Textb...=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1319640151&sr=1-6

My biggest grip is that there is little on development. I just purchased the Kindle version of Essentials by Lewis:
http://www.amazon.com/Essentials-Ad...27/ref=sr_1_10?ie=UTF8&qid=1319639823&sr=8-10

It's not bad so far.

The book I used when I was a 4th year med student as well as a 3rd resident as a quick review was:
http://www.amazon.com/Child-Adolesc...r_1_13?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1319640164&sr=1-13

This is a very well written short book that you could easily go through in a few days. The problem is that it is lacks depth (not the purpose of the book) and it was published in 2006 making it a little outdated.

I also have the Kaplan synopsis book:
http://www.amazon.com/Sadocks-Conci...=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1319640308&sr=1-1

It's pretty good. The writing, however, is a little disjointed. But not a bad book.