Health Behavior Change: A Guide for Practitioners

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Summary: Great book, indeed
Review: A simple, easy, and yet deep, thought-provoking book. ONLY ONE of this kind.

I am tring hard to implement some of their methods in Japan.

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Summary: Full of practical ideas for clinicians
Review: Helping patients change health-related behavior is a universal challenge for health care providers. In this extremely practical book, Rollnick and colleagues present a method for helping patients change based on the principles and "spirit" of Motivational Interviewing.

After presenting the basic concepts, each chapter focuses on a different task in the consultation process, from building rapport and setting an agenda to increasing motivation for change while minimizing resistance. The techniques presented are intended for use in brief consultations, but may be adapted for more extended encounters. Numerous clinical examples illustrating applications in diverse settings (and even some showing how NOT to do it) bring each strategy to life. Always respectful of the busy practitioner, the authors suggest ways for you to benefit from the book even if you have just a few hours to spend with it, and they encourage "creative adaptation" rather than "slavish adoption" of their approach.

If you want to become better at helping people change health-related behavior, and are new to a Stages of Change or Motivational Interviewing-based approach, this is a great place to start. If you have some experience with Motivational Interviewing, you will find a simplified model, a fresh take on familiar strategies, and probably some new ideas too. Reviewed by Deborah Van Horn, originally posted 3/6/02.

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Summary: Rollnick et all rock!
Review: I am a nurse who has worked in the areas of AIDS Counseling and testing, Family Planning and now drug abuse prevention in a school. Sometimes I am called upon to talk to students and "get them worried" about their drug and alcohol use. Much of what I read felt too coercive with students and, in practice, evoked much resistance. This book contains readily applicable techniques for helping your hear your clients concerns better so that you do understand their behavior in the context of their real lives and allows you to help move them toward concern and possibly behavior change. This should be a book included in ALL nursing curricula because of it's readily hands-on use capacity. Surely, reading and applying the book has been a processs (and much like behavior change itself) not a quick fix application. Great stuff.

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Summary: Talking to Patients About Behavior Change
Review: Many of the chronic illnesses and other problems that cause people to seek health care are closely linked to behavioral patterns related to issues such as diet, exercise, smoking, drinking, and stress. Treatment is often addressed to acute care without helping patients examine and change the underlying behaviors. There are good reasons why this is so. Managed care increasingly limits the amount of time that medical professionals can spend with patients. Many doctors, nurses, and other health professionals feel unprepared or frustrated about changing patient behavior patterns. Indeed, medical training usually provides little guidance in how to help patients change health behaviors.

In this clearly written and highly practical little book, Rollnick and his colleagues offer a range of effective methods that can be used within the context and time constraints of primary or specialist care. The goal is not to turn doctors and nurses into counselors or psychotherapists. Rather, they argue persuasively that there is much that can be done within medical practice to help patients change the behavior patterns that bring them back again and again to the doctor's office. The methods are well-described, and derived from research on effective brief interventions for behavior change.

Rating:
Summary: not that great, not much "guide"ance
Review: This book gave helpful perspectives regarding doctor-patient communication, but was not very enlightening. The problem might be that it was written from the perspective that the doctor is always correct, and the patient is always some poor sap who needs to be enlightened and trained as you would a child. I don't see this book awakening the human within some budding physician and transforming the physician into some effective communicator. The worst part was how many pages it took to convey helpful information.

I gave it more than one star because it does have good strategies in it, and I believe reading it would be better than reading nothing.