Psychotherapy of bereavement after homicide.
The author presents guidelines for the assessment and initial treatment of bereavement after a homicide. Early interventions include nonverbal techniques applied in individual and group therapy. Because patients are over-whelmed and reactive, initial treatment strategy is supportive and focuses on reestablishing resiliency rather than on preexisting vulnerabilities (ambivalence, guilt, repression, denial). Adjustment to homicidal dying is lifelong, and therapist and patient should acknowledge that change may be limited.
Section of Psychiatry, Virginia Mason Medical Center, Seattle, Washington.
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