AEGiS-BKREV: Counseling Chemically Dependent People with HIV Illness

Counseling Chemically Dependent People with HIV Illness

Harrington Park Press, 10 Alice St., Binghamton, NY 13904-1580. 172p., bibliog. ISBN 1-56023-016-9. $14.95. (Contributors to this volume: Esther Chachkes, Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center in New York City; Iris Davis, St. Vincent's Hospital and Medical Center; Barbara G. Faltz, Santa Clara County Drug Abuse Services; Michele Fontaine, Greenwich House Counseling Center in Manhattan; Darrell Greene, Gay Men's Health Crisis in New York City; Yvonne Harris, St. Luke's/Roosevelt Substance Abuse Program in Manhattan; Stuart Kaufer, Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center; Hannah Kusterer, Friendship House Association of American Indians; Donald McVinney, Gay Men's Health Crisis; Melvin I. Pohl, PRIDE Institute; Sabina Primack, Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center in New York City; William Reulbach, Montefiore Medical Center; Ron Rowell, National Native American AIDS Prevention Center; Peter S, a person with AIDS; Edith Springer, Clinton Peer AIDS Education Coalition; Evelyn Ullah, Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center; Carol Weiss, Cornell University Medical Center; Paul Zakrewski, Bellevue Hospital)
Edited by Michael Shernoff. 1991.

This book was originally published as Journal of Chemical Dependency Treatment, v.4, no.2, 1991. AIDS and drugs is now recognized as a devasting combination. Unfortunately, governmental response has not been the best in meeting the needs of this group of people who are usually poor and people of color. In fact, there are some drug centers that try not to work with these people because they do not want to work with those individuals who have a drug problem and are HIV+. This book is intended to help professionals who are working with chemical dependency "gain a better understanding of how to work with their own chemically dependent clients who have HIV illness."

The first chapter is by a person who has AIDS and is recovering from alcoholism and drug addicition and the second chapter presents the varieties of medical problems that are associated with people who have a chemical dependency and are infected with the virus. Each of the remaining chapters covers a specific problem or area of concern: counseling chemically dependent HIV positive adolescents, working with individuals in a hospital setting, persons with HIV on methadone maintenance, treatment of gay men with HIV infection, Native American substance abusers, counseling incarcerated individuals, psychotherapy, residential treatment, AIDS prevention with active drug users, and countertransference in professionals working with chemically dependent clients with HIV. Each of the chapters is a case study, presenting background information, research, methods, study, and results. As an example the chapter "Care of HIV Infected Native American Substance Abusers" studies the clients at the Friendship House Association of American Indians in San Francisco. The first part of the chapter discusses the makeup of the clients, type of chemical dependency, the gay/bisexual aspects, lesbian problems, and an indication of how much they know about AIDS. Three separate case studies are presented followed by a brief discussion of post-traumatic stress syndrome. The final paragraph sums up the problem as one of concern that AIDS is presently under-reported for Native Americans and based on the high incidence of sexually transmitted diseases in general, drug abuse centers will be faced with more and more HIV infected Native Americans.

The other chapters are very similar to this one. They are not detailed but give the facts in well-written text that professional counselors will find as informative and directive. Since this is just one issue of a periodical, there is no index to this work, but the table of contents is adequate enough to guide the reader to the chapter of interest. Counselors will probably find that reading the entire work will be the greatest benefit, since each chapter covers a topic that will at sometime be of concern to any counselor at a drug dependency center. This is a recommended book for all medical libraries, as well as large public and academic libraries. Counselors will want their own copy if they do not subscribe to the journal. (H. Robert Malinowsky)

Keywords: Substance Abuse; Counseling; HIV Infections; Substance Dependence; Drugs and AIDS)

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Copyright © 1993 - The University of Illinois at Chicago. All materials in the journal are subject to copyright by the Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois and may be reprinted or redistributed for the noncommercial purpose of scientific or educational advancement granted by Sections 107 and 108 of the Copyright Revision Act of 1976. For other reprinting, redistribution, or translation, address requests to H. Robert Malinowsky, University of Illinois at Chicago Library, PO Box 8198, Chicago, IL 60680 or electronically to hrm@uic.edu.

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