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This new diagnostic guidebook, published by the Psychiatric Association of Latin America in 2004, is of special interest to transcultural psychiatry as it devotes considerable space to the cultural and ethnic aspects of mental disorders. Professor S. J. Villlaseñor-Bayardo, University of Guadalajara, Mexico, member of the WPA Transcultural Psychiatry Section, was entrusted with the edition of this volume, to which many experts contributed; prominently among them Professor J. E. Mezzich of the WPA Secretariat. In the introductory chapter, a section on “Latin American Ethnopsychiatry” informs the general psychiatrist on definitions of ethnomedicine, ethnopsychiatry, and folkloric medicine, and on maladies known in Latin America under traditional ethnic names; the authors conclude that the influence of Western rationalism has in Latin America not entirely replaced traditional ways of perceiving life, illness, and death. Another introductory section discusses old and new psychosocial problems of the continent, and closes with the demand that the works of well-known Latin American ethnologists and ethnopsychiatrists should be a fundamental part of medical school curricula.

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2008-06-02   |   5,264 visitas   |   Evalua este artículo 0 valoraciones

Vol. 7 Núm.1. Abril 2005 Pags. 63 Inv salud 2005; VII(1)