Psychological therapies

• Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT)

  • Aim = help ppl identify irrational thoughts + try to change them
  • Patients helped to make sense of how their delusions + hallucinations impact their feelings + behaviour
  • Offering explanations to symptoms may reduce anxiety + help them realise their beliefs are not based on reality
• Family therapies

  • To improve communication + interaction in the family
  • Try to reduce stress within family that may relate to relapsing - by reducing level of EE
  • Strategies to help reduce:

  1. Reduce stress
  2. Improve ability of family to solve problems
  3. Reduce guilt + anger in family members
  4. Improve beliefs + behaviour of SZ
• Limitation of PS: Limited benefits

  • CBT found to be significant but had small effect on pos + neg symptoms
  • Also, Pharaoh reviewed the effectiveness of family therapies + found moderate evidence for the reduction of hospital readmissions - inconsistent
  • Limited evidence to show effectiveness
• Limitation of PS: Help but not cure

  • CBT helps patients make sense of symptoms
  • Family therapies reduce stress
  • Token economies help to make behaviour more socially acceptable
  • Suggest use biological therapies as they don’t cure SZ but can reduce the severity of symptoms