Cognitive Psychotherapy of Psychotic and Personality Disorders

This book reviews the development of Cognitive Behavior Therapy (CBT) and its use with patients suffering from schizophrenia or other severe personality disorders. The effectiveness of CBT is highlighted through case studies of dissociative disorders, borderline personality disorders and narcissistic personality disorders. A special section on dealing with uncommunicative patients with personality disorders completes the overview. Psychotherapeutic and Cognitive-behavioral Treatments for Schizophrenia: Developing a Disorder-specific Form of Psychotherapy for Persons with Psychosis (L. Davidson, et al.).

Defining the Concept of Individual Vulnerability as a Base for Psychotherapeutic Interventions (C. Perris).

When the Going Gets Tough: Cognitive Therapy for the Severely Disturbed (T. Vallis).

The Assessment of Dysfunctional Working Models of Self and Others in Severely Disturbed Patients: A Preliminary Cross-National Study (C. Perris, et al.).

State-of-the-Art Approaches in the Treatment of Information-Processing Disorders in Schizophrenia (B. Hodel & H. Brenner).

Cognitive-behavioural Coping-Orientated Therapy for Schizophrenia: A New Treatment Model for Clinical Service and Research (A. Schaub).

Options and Clinical Decision Making in the Assessment and Psychological Treatment of Persistent Hallucinations and Delusions (L. Yusupoff & G. Haddock).

Understanding the Inexplicable: An Individually Formulated Cognitive Approach to Delusional Beliefs (D. Fowler, et al.).

Pathogeny and Therapy (S. Sassaroli & R. Lorenzini).

Early Intervention in Psychotic Disorders: A Critical Step in the Prevention of Psychological Morbidity (J. Edwards & P. McGorry).

An Integrated, Multilevels, Metacognitive Approach to the Treatment of Patients with a Schizophrenic Disorder or a Severe Personality Disorder (C. Perris & L. Skagerlind).

Preventively-Orientated Psychological Interventions in Early Psychosis (P. McGorry, et al.).

The Grief of Mental Illness: Context for the Cognitive Therapy of Schizophrenia (V. Lafond).

A Systematic Cognitive Therapy Approach to Schizo-Affective Psychosis (D. Turkington & D. Kingdon).

Cognitive-behavioral Approaches to the Treatment of Personality Disorders (J. Pretzer).

The Assessment of Personality Disorder: Selected Issues and Directions (H. Jackson).

Less Common Therapeutic Strategies and Techniques in the Cognitive Psychotherapy of Severely Disturbed Patients (H. Perris).

Metacognition and Motivational Systems in Psychotherapy: A Cognitive-evolutionary Approach to the Treatment of Difficult Patients (G. Liotti & B. Intreccialagli).

A Cognitive-behavioural Approach to the Understanding and Management of Obsessive-compulsive Personality Disorder (M. Kyrios).

Interpersonal Process in the Treatment of Narcissistic Personality Disorders (E. Peyton & J. Safran).

Cognitive Psychotherapy in the Treatment of Personality Disorders in the Elderly (L. Bizzini).

Indexes. "...The breadth and length of this book ensure that there is something for everyone here..." (Psychological Medicine, Vol.31, 2001)

"The most bang for your buck, and this edited text may just be the boost you are looking for" (Journal of Cognitive Psychotherapy, June 2002)

Carlo Perris, MD, has been the Director, World Health Organization, Professor of Psychiatry and Head, Department of Psychiatry Umea University Hospital Umea, Sweden. Patrick Dennistoun McGorry AO FAA FASSA FAHMS FRCP FRANZCP is an Irish-born Australian psychiatrist known for his development of the early intervention services for emerging mental disorders in young people. Psychotic and personality disorders account for a large proportion of serious mental disorder, which can strike at the young and threaten normality and well-being through a lifetime, as well as at the old, destroying the quality of life in later years. These disorders are now being given priority by funders of mental health services. Many clinicians are using cognitive psychotherapy as an effective, person-centred psychological approach to the assessment, treatment and prevention of these serious mental disorders. This volume represents an authoritative survey of knowledge and practice by the leading research and clinical workers in this field of cognitive psychotherapy. Over recent years an impressive amount of research and clinical evidence has supported the effectiveness of cognitive therapy and related psychological treatment approaches, sometimes in conjunction with a new generation of antipsychotic and antidepressant drugs with better efficacy and lower side effects. The attraction of cognitive interventions is that they are empowering and humanistic in their respect for the person, they are based on clinically testable theories, they are highly compatible with biological models of vulnerability and disorder, and they are pragmatic in terms of length and depth of intervention. Further, within the cognitive approach, as demonstrated in this volume, there can be a range of approaches to the patient. All of these have in common an optimistic and humane approach to patients and their disorders. From the Foreword by Aaron Beck " the different articles in the book have been successful in applying many of the principles of cognitive therapy and have added much more in verifying the treatment of conditions such as dissociative disorders and personality disorders."