Bereavement

Colin Murray Parkes is Consultant psychiatrist Emeritus at St Christopher's Hospice and Honorary Consultant Psychiatrist to the Royal London Hospital and the Tavistock Clinic, London. He is Life President of Cruse Bereavement Care and in 1996 was awarded an OBE for services to bereaved people.Holly Prigerson is Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School and Director, Centre for Psycho-oncology & Palliative Care Research, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, USA.

• Bowlby, Foreword to the First Edition. Lifton, Foreword to the Fourth Edition. Acknowledgements. Introduction. The Cost of Commitment. The Broken Heart. Trauma. Attachment and Loss. Mitigation. Anger and Guilt. Changing the Assumptive World. Complicated Grief. Determinants of Grief I: Kinship, Gender and Age. Determinants of Grief II: Mode of Death. Determinants of Grief III: Personal Vulnerability. Determinants of Grief IV: Social, Religious and Cultural Influences. Helping the Bereaved I: Bereavement Support – History and Evaluation. Helping the Bereaved II: Types of Help for Types of Problem. Helping the Bereaved III: Sources of Help. Reactions to Other Types of Loss. Disasters. Appendices. Organisation in the UK and USA Offering Help to Bereaved People. Recommended Further Reading. References

"What makes this text unique is the writing ability of the author. Parkes, an obviously passionate researcher and practitioner, is able to weave eloquent verses on personal struggle with the more factual explanations of research-based studies on similar topics. The end result is a book that appeals to researchers, practitioners, and those who have recently suffered the loss of a loved one. His simultaneous ability to draw out the painful emotions of grief and the realistic information resentation from respected scholars makes Bereavement an easy recommendation for anyone interested in learning more about this topic." - Kelly A. Kagawa-Tabay, Activities, Adaptation & Ageing, Vol 35, 2011