The Origins of Health and Disease

Integrates findings in health psychology, psychoneuroimmunology and psychotherapy to provide a new explanation for health and disease.

Michael E. Hyland (Author)

9780521895392, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 21 April 2011

356 pages, 58 b/w illus. 7 tables
23.5 x 15.5 x 2.1 cm, 0.68 kg

'From a tangled skein of data, Michael Hyland has woven a rich theoretical tapestry with wide ranging implications of health research, clinical practice, and daily living. It provides a wealth of cogent and testable hypotheses concerning medical conditions that are currently, at best, poorly understood.' Irving Kirsch, Professor Emeritus, University of Hull and University of Connecticut Lecturer, Harvard Medical School

Some phenomena in medicine and psychology remain unexplained by current theory. Chronic fatigue syndrome, repetitive strain injury and irritable bowel syndrome, for example, are all diseases or syndromes that cannot be explained in terms of a physiological abnormality. In this intriguing book, Michael E. Hyland proposes that there is a currently unrecognised type of illness which he calls 'dysregulatory disease'. Hyland shows how such diseases develop and how the communication and art of medicine, good nursing care, complementary medicine and psychotherapy can all act to reduce the dysregulation that leads to dysregulatory disease. The Origins of Health and Disease is a fascinating book that develops a novel theory for understanding health and disease, and demonstrates how this theory is supported by existing data, and how it explains currently unexplained phenomena. Hyland also shows how his theory leads to new testable predictions that, in turn, will lead to further scientific advancement and development.

1. The two philosophies: health, disease, medicine and psychotherapy
2. The body's mind: psychoneuroimmunology, stress and adaptive response
3. Personality, disease and the meaning of infornet dysregulation
4. Networks and their properties
5. The causes of dysregulation: associative learning, food intolerance and the effects of stress throughout the lifespan
6. The causes of dysregulation: supervised learning, repetitive strain injury, attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder, chronic fatigue syndrome and depression
7. The causes of dysregulation: asthma and precursors to specific disease
8. Three different types of psychologically mediated therapy: placebos and the art of medicine, psychotherapy and complementary and alternative medicine
9. Therapeutic mechanisms
10. Finding the pattern: health in modern society
11. Infornet theory in perspective.

Subject Areas: Complementary medicine [MX], Clinical psychology [MMJ], Physiological & neuro-psychology, biopsychology [JMM]