Psychological Therapy Flashcards
1
Q
Psychological Therapy
Understanding CBT
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy
A
- CBT can help make sense of irrational cognitions such as halluncinations.
- For example, helping patients understand that auditory hallucinations are just a misfunction of the speech centre in the brain.
- This makes it less frightening and debilitating as patients can recognise that it cannot harm them if they ignore it.
- CBT will not elminate symptoms but instead improve the patients ability to function.
2
Q
Psychological Therapy
Normalising Hallucinations
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy
A
- Normalisation can help people hearing voices by being taught that voice-hearing is an extension of the ordinary experience of thinking in words.
- Delusions can also be helped with reality testing in which the therapist examines the liklihood of the beliefs being true.
3
Q
Psychological Therapy
Family Therapy
How it helps
A
- Family therapy aims to improve communication beteen the family and the identified patient using a few methods:
- Reducing negative emotions - family therapy aims to reduce EE because reducing stress is important to reduce the risk of a relapse.
- Improves family’s ability to function - a therapeutic alliance is formed whereby they all agree on the aims of therapy and create understanding and balance between caring for the individual and allowing independence.
4
Q
Psychological Therapy
A Model of Practice
Family Therapy
A
- The model starts with providing emotional and practical support.
- Phase 2-3 involve identifying resources and encouraging mutual understanding.
- Phase 4 identifies unhelpful patterns.
- Phase 5 is about developing skills such as stress managment.
- Finally, phase 6-7 looks at relapse prevention and maintenance for future.
5
Q
Psychological Therapy: Evaluation
Evidence for Effectiveness
Strength
A
- A review of 34 studies on CBT for schizophrenia concluded it has small but significant effects on positive and negative hallucinations.
- NICE 2019 recommends CBT for schizophrenia.
This means that research and clinical experience support the benefits of CBT for schizophrenia.
6
Q
Psychological Therapy: Evaluation
Quality of Evidence
Limitation
A
- CBT techniques vary widely between cases of schizophrenia.
- Thomas (2015) points out that different studies of CBT are conducted on different combinations of symptoms.
- The modest benefits of CBT probably conceal a variety of effects on different symptoms.
This make it challenging to say how effective CBT will be for a particular person.
7
Q
Psychological Therapy: Evaluation
Reduced Relapse Rates
Strength
A
- A study concluded family therapy is a consistently effective treatment.
- Relapse rates were found to be reduced by 50-60%.
- Using family therapy as mental health initially begins to decline is particularly promising in treating schizophrenia.
This means that family therapy is likely to be a benefit to a range of peole with schizophrenia.
