Evaluating Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders in the Forensic Context: A Manual for Mental Health Practice

The book is for medical and mental health clinicians who need to evaluate adolescents and adults in the legal context for fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD). It provides practical procedures for forensic and clinical settings, including protocols for interviewing birth mothers and a methodology for differential diagnosis. It serves as 'best practices' for comprehensive forensic mental health evaluation of potential FASD in juveniles and adult defendants and victims.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 507 pages
Publication date: 30 August 2022
Publisher: Springer Nature Switzerland AG

This book is designed for medical and mental health clinicians who face the task of assessing adolescents and adults in legal contexts who may have fetal alcohol spectrum disorder (FASD). The contributors to this book are experts in their respective fields, offering a diverse range of expertise and perspectives on the forensic investigation of FASD. The primary goal of the book is to provide clinicians with practical procedures that can be used in various forensic and clinical settings. It includes protocols that have been successfully used in legal matters such as rights waiver and competency, capital murder, and sexual offending. In addition, the book provides detailed guidelines for interviewing birth mothers about substance use during pregnancy and introduces a methodology that can be used in the absence of exposure confirmation to arrive at a sound diagnostic conclusion through the process of differential diagnosis. Taken as a whole, the methodological procedures described by the contributors to the book serve as 'best practices' for comprehensive forensic mental health evaluation of potential FASD in juveniles and adult defendants as well as in victims.

Weight: 842g
Dimension: 235 x 155 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9783030736309
Edition number: 1st ed. 2021