The Existential Intervention: Individual Meaning-Centered Psychotherapy
When an oncologist tells a patient their cancer is terminal, the medical treatment fails, but the psychological crisis has just begun. The patient is instantly plunged into a terrifying loss of identity, purpose, and meaning. Individual Meaning-Centered Psychotherapy for Patients with Advanced Cancer: A Treatment Manual is a fiercely structured, highly clinical psychological manual designed to intercept this despair. This volume provides the precise therapeutic blueprints required to help a dying patient reconstruct their reason for living.
Mastering the Legacy Project
The core philosophy of this text is the deliberate construction of meaning. The manual aggressively details the Viktor Frankl-inspired protocol. It dictates exactly how a therapist guides a terminal patient through a structured, 7-session intervention, actively forcing the patient to shift their focus from the physical destruction of their body to the permanent, indestructible legacy they are leaving for their children.
Navigating Demoralization Syndrome
The book provides a masterclass in clinical differentiation. It dictates the exact diagnostic pathways for separating grief from pathology. It rigorously explores how to distinguish between a patient experiencing normal, expected sadness about dying, versus a patient suffering from clinical “Demoralization”—a profound psychiatric crisis characterized by a complete inability to experience joy, requiring immediate, structured psychological rescue.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Is this a generic self-help book about staying positive?
Absolutely not. It is a strictly structured, *evidence-based clinical treatment manual* developed at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center specifically for licensed psychotherapists.
Who is the primary audience?
It is the absolute, mandatory clinical guide for Psycho-Oncologists, Clinical Psychologists, Palliative Care Social Workers, and Hospice Counselors.
