Long-Term Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: A Basic Text by Glen O. Gabbard

From the Publisher

The thirst to understand, to & ldquo;know thyself,& rdquo; is as strong as ever& mdash;despite managed care's demands, society's & ldquo;quick fix& rdquo; mentality, and psychopharmacology's remarkable progress& mdash;and goes a long way toward explaining the continued popularity of long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy.

The first of five volumes in the groundbreaking Core Competencies in Psychotherapy series, this exceptionally practical text by a renowned expert introduces students and professionals to the basic principles of long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy, focusing on long-term dynamic work with adults in individual therapy.

Unlike other texts, this concise yet comprehensive volume


• Takes difficult theoretical concepts and makes them accessible and practical for psychotherapists who want to master long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy
• Grows directly from the author's teaching experience with trainees and their questions and concerns and is thus directly linked to the types of learning problems encountered by the students who will use this book
• Uses clinical vignettes to show how to apply the key principles of psychodynamic theory to difficult clinical cases and how to grapple with the dilemmas that often arise in psychotherapeutic work
• Provides both residents and training directors with a guide to achieving core competency in this field, as mandated by the Residency Review Committee for Psychiatry.

The author's approach reflects his personal therapeutic style& mdash;developed over 25 years of practice& mdash;and draws from several theoretical models, illustrating the pluralism in the field today and his ownsynthesis of those diverse conceptual frameworks.

Beginning with a review of basic psychodynamic principles, the author then discusses how to assess patients, write a formulation, and think about indications and contraindications for long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy. In additional chapters, the author focuses on major issues such as starting the therapy, the use of interventions, goals and therapeutic action, ways to work with resistance, countertransference, the use of fantasies and dreams, and termination of therapy. The last two chapters cover the optimal use of supervision and how to measure core competency achievement.

Though written with the psychiatric resident in mind, this remarkably practical text will appeal to a broad audience of trainees in fields such as psychology, social work, counseling, and nursing. It will also be welcomed by educators and students alike as an invaluable teaching tool that can be & ldquo;put to work& rdquo; right away as a powerful adjunct to supervision, classroom teaching, and clinical experience with a variety of patients.

Doody Review Services

Reviewer:Breitung U. Jasmin, MD(Rush University Medical Center)
Description:This book describes the essential concepts of psychodynamic psychotherapy in a manner that is easily understandable by a broad audience. The basic tenets are supported by evidence-based research whenever possible and are further illustrated by useful clinical vignettes.
Purpose:The purpose, according to the author, is to help train health professionals to competency in the field of long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy, one of the five psychotherapies now mandated by the Psychiatric Residency Review Committee. This is done by providing an overview of theoretical principles and models and how to implement therapeutic interventions. These objectives are largely met and the book fulfills a need.
Audience:According to the author, the book was written not only for training psychiatry residents, but for a broad audience of health professionals as well, such as psychologists, social workers, counselors, nurses and even training directors. This book is definitely of use for all of the above. The author is quite accomplished in the fields of psychodynamic psychotherapy, having many years of clinical and research experience in the field.
Features:This book covers essential concepts in psychodynamic psychotherapy, such as transference, countertransference, dreams and fantasies, therapeutic interventions, boundary crossing, the use of supervision, to name just a few. The author presents these in an organized manner supporting his material whenever possible with the available research. Each topic is given more or less equal weight, resulting in a broadoverview, rather than specific detailed discussions of any one subject. To illustrate the contents further there are some tables and figures that summarize the material and provide new information not always provided in the text. Of highest value to the reader are the clinical vignettes that are dispersed throughout the book. The vignettes are excellent examples of theoretical models and concepts as well as therapeutic interventions. Shortcomings include the fact that a discussion on the use of pharmacotherapies in conjunction with psychotherapy is omitted, as well as financial considerations inherent in long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy. Considering that this book is an overview, the author might have discussed this as well. He appropriately limits himself to one-on-one adult therapy, as discussions of couple, family or group therapy would have been beyond the scope of this book.
Assessment:This is an excellent brief overview of basic concepts in psychodynamic psychotherapy and is thereby highly useful to the beginning clinician during training. It accomplishes the goal of providing adequate information to the clinician in this field. It is not as useful to the clinician who is more experienced, since it is a basic text and covers each area briefly and not in great detail.

Rating

4 Stars! from Doody

Product Details

• ISBN: 1585621447
  
• ISBN-13: 9781585621446
• Format: Textbook Paperback, 224pp
• Publisher: American Psychiatric Publishing, Inc.
• Pub. Date: March 2004
• Edition Number: 1
• Sales Rank: 35,322
• Series: Core Competencies in Psychotherapy Ser.

• Table of Contents

Table of Contents