A Tavistock Clinic psychotherapist has launched a new book tackling previously overlooked topics in family therapy.

Jenny Altschuler has published Counselling and Psychotherapy for Families in Times of Illness and Death, which updates a book she published 15 year ago called Working With Chronic Illness: a Family Approach.

She said: “I wrote the new edition because I became increasingly aware there are areas of counselling which are not receiving enough attention.

“Most of all I hope that it will be useful to doctors across many different areas of practice and healthcare.”

Mrs Altschuler is an independent psychotherapist who spent a total of 15 years working in Hampstead at the Tavistock Clinic and before that at the Royal Free Hospital.

Her book has been informed by decades of experience working with families affected by serious illness worldwide.

The revised edition contains material on the challenges to the therapist caused by migration within families and cultural difference.

Over the years Mrs Altschuler has worked to improve access to counselling in areas of greatest need across the world.

With the charity One to One Children’s Fund she has helped establish family counselling centres in war-torn Kosovo.