ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book addresses specific issues in the treatment of the sizable minority. Since epidemiology and psychopharmacology displaced psycho-dynamics from the center stage of child and adolescent psychiatry and psychology, clinicians of all professional disciplines have felt under greater pressure to medicate adolescents, even if on an empirical basis. The conclusions from the extended segment of the Treatment of Early-Onset Schizophrenia Spectrum (TEOSS) study are perhaps even more dramatic. To determine the long-term efficacy and safety of antipsychotic medications in adolescents after one year of treatment, strict, double-blind protocols were maintained after the acute phase, eight-week study. Parenthetically, recently similar conclusions have been reported about publication bias leading to overestimation of the efficacy of cognitive-behavioral therapy and other psychological treatments for adult depression.
