Article citationsMore>>

Dimaggio, G., Carcione, A., Salvatore, G., Semerari, A., and Nicolò, G. (2010) A rational model for maximizing the effects of therapeutic relationship regulation in personality disorders with poor metacognition and overregulation of affects. Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory Research and Practice, 83, 363-384. doi:10.1348/147608310X485256

has been cited by the following article:

• TITLE: Integrative therapy for personality disorders: Experiences in developing integrative approaches for treatment-refractory personality-disordered clients

  AUTHORS: Nazir Hussain

  KEYWORDS: Personality Disorder; Mental Health Issues; Integrative Therapy; Treatment Refractory; Borderline Personality Disorder; Suicidal Behaviour; Safety Seeking Behaviours; Emotional Dysregulation

  JOURNAL NAME: Health, Vol.5 No.5, May 27, 2013

  ABSTRACT: Personality Disordered (herein referred to as PD) clients are challenging to statutory mental healthcare programmes. They can be difficult to diagnose: their disorders can be obscured by second-order problems such as anxiety and depression, caused by PD cognitive processes. Treatment-as-usual (the predominant model of psychiatric intervention) for PD clients in crisis tends to focus on these second-order presentations, but provide no means of identifying underlying PD. The purpose of this paper is to describe how heuristic methods of diagnosis can be used to reframe the client’s distress in the context of personality disorders (according to DSM-IV criteria), and how subsequent application of integrative therapies can break their cycle of recidivism. Method: Two case studies of treatment-refractory individuals with cyclical patterns of crisis-point service engagement for self-harm or psychotic depression where heuristic/ integrative therapies were used. Results: The use of integrative therapies in the case studies presented resulted in a marked change in recidivism and quality of life for each client, as measured by a significant reduction in presentation of symptoms and hypervigilance. Discussion: By understanding the maladaptive cognitive-behavioural processes of PD clients, they can be modified to reduce the client’s self-defeating behavioural patterns, breaking the cycle of recidivism. However, a new diagnostic strategy must first be formulated that looks at the clients past use of mental health services to detect underlying PD.