Nurses, Colleagues, and Patients: How to Achieve Congenial Interpersonal Relationships

John Jacono is an assistant professor of Nursing at Laurentian
University.

Health-care professionals, like everyone else, carry with them the
potential for acting and reacting in unhealthy ways. Unlike others,
however, they are charged with helping others who need to break out of
unhealthy lifestyle habits. This book is designed to alert the reader
(primarily the helping professional) to the various components of
dysfunctional behavior in clients, colleagues, and themselves.

In a nonthreatening (nontechnical), informal manner reminiscent of a
talk with a staid aunt, the author uses a mixture of exhortation,
self-disclosure, checklists, and practical advice to address a number of
common elements in dysfunctional interactions. She manages to weave a
tapestry full of promise for a healthy existence.

This book will be a precious resource for the experienced caregiver in
need of a refresher or for the emergent professional. It may, however,
also be interpreted by some as a do-it-yourself manual for achieving
mental health. There is of course no defence against this eventuality.
Yet under certain circumstances, certain individuals will need the
expert guidance of a helping professional. Had this issue, difficult as
it is to discuss without infringing on the diagnostician’s territory,
been promoted more overtly, it would have greatly enhanced an already
valuable work.