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The authors, a psychiatrist and a psychiatric nurse, have changed the title of their latest edition because of an increased emphasis on nursing procedures in this, the fourth, edition. This title is apt to be misleading, since, except for the added chapter on nursing procedures, the emphasis is still chiefly on psychiatry. In the fourth edition the chapter on the development of the mind has been omitted, without destroying the value of the text. Discussion of the organic psychoses is now confined to two chapters less than formerly but gives adequate consideration to the more common conditions.
Throughout the volume there is commendable emphasis on the thinking, feeling and behaving of human beings, rather than strictly on the investigation, diagnosis and treatment of psychiatric patients. The instructions to the nurse along the lines of the patient's thinking, feeling and behaving are too general. The chapter entitled "Principles of Psychiatric Nursing"