Book Description

Human Trafficking: A Treatment Guide for Mental Health Professionals is an educational and clinical resource for health care practitioners from any discipline who may encounter sex- or labor-trafficked persons. The book's editors direct the Baylor College of Medicine Anti-Human Trafficking Program in Houston, and in the last year, they have identified close to 100 trafficked persons in their hospital's small inpatient psychiatry unit--a rate that appears to be growing. Their extensive experience has made them uniquely qualified to pen this guide, which is singular in delivering the background knowledge and frontline clinical strategies providers need to identify, relate to, and treat these psychologically wounded, yet resilient patients. Each chapter begins with a compelling clinical case to bring the often-horrifying conditions these patients have endured into focus and to contextualize the pertinent research, assessment, and treatment information that follows. The chapters address epidemiology and screening, general and specific management principles in different settings, and specific topics such as managing concomitant substance use disorders, issues pertaining to children, advocacy, confidentiality and reporting requirements, psychotherapeutic principles, cultural issues, and trafficked persons' accounts of their own experiences with the health care system. Designed to enlighten and instruct, Human Trafficking: A Treatment Guide for Mental Health Professionals is a wake-up call and a wise and worldly companion for clinicians serving this overlooked population.