Art Therapy With Older Adults: A Sourcebook

This book constitutes an important step in demonstrating that art therapy is a unique offering for persons aged sixty-five years and older, giving the potential for enrichment and healing in those lives. Describing the various ways in which art therapy can be used in the treatment of mental and emotional problems of older adults, the editor encourages the reader to use the suggestions and concepts within or tailor them to suit one's own specific working environment or population. Divided into three sections, this book proposes creative art therapies interventions, directives, and ideas along with model programs and examples of work in different settings. Section I discusses art therapy interventions and ideas for treatment, including working with ceramics, sandtray, memory books, and directives. Section II deals with working with specific populations of older adults, caregivers of older adults, and older adults in long-term care and residential settings. In addition, working with older adults with Alzheimer's disease is addressed in this section. Section III focuses on working with individual older adult clients, home-based art therapy, grandmothers raising troubled teenagers, hospice patients, and mentally ill geriatrics. Readers will find this book to be a sourcebook of information. It will have great appeal to human service practitioners, health and mental health practitioners, and educators in social work, psychology, nursing, and counseling.