The domain of supportive psychotherapy has expanded in recent years, reflecting changes in how psychotherapy is conducted and the role psychotherapy plays in caring for individuals facing difficult life experiences or living with diverse mental and physical disorders. This new, thoroughly revised and up-to-date edition of Learning Supportive Psychotherapy: An Illustrated Guide (first published as Introduction to Supportive Psychotherapy) instructs beginning psychotherapists in the fundamentals of this treatment modality, which focuses on patients' overall health and well-being and their ability to adapt constructively to their life circumstances. The linchpin of supportive psychotherapy -- and, indeed, all psychotherapy -- is the establishment of a true therapeutic alliance. Accordingly, the authors provide readers with skills aimed at instilling trust and establishing a productive therapeutic relationship, including techniques for alliance building, enhancing ego functioning, and reducing and preventing anxiety. In addition, the authors explore the general framework of supportive psychotherapy, including indications, phases of treatment, initiation and termination of sessions, and professional boundaries; explain how to perform a thorough patient evaluation and case formulation; and describe the process of setting realistic goals with the patient. The following features and areas of focus enhance the book's utility: Integral to the text's practical approach are the video case vignettes that accompany several of the chapters. These videos model effective psychotherapeutic techniques and strategies, which readers can incorporate into their skill sets. The chapter on crisis intervention has been thoroughly revised to integrate recent research findings on posttraumatic stress disorder, suicide, and critical incident stress management, and the illustrative multipart case vignette provides a therapeutic narrative that is compelling, relatable, and instructive. The material on the therapeutic alliance focuses on skill building, including how to anticipate and avoid disruption in treatment, how to discuss the therapeutic relationship with the patient, how to modify distorted perceptions using clarification and confrontation, how to deal with negative transference and therapeutic impasses, and how to reframe statements in a supportive manner. Outcome research receives its own chapter, in which the authors review the robust evidence base for the efficacy of supportive psychotherapy, including a number of outcome trials, bolstering the necessity of learning the techniques outlined in the book. The book concludes with 75 questions and answers to test the reader's comprehension and identify areas for further study. This new edition of Learning Supportive Psychotherapy: An Illustrated Guide builds on the well-earned reputation of previous editions. Beginning clinicians first learning the techniques of psychotherapy and veterans who must assess competence in the psychiatry residents they supervise will find the help they need in this down-to-earth, clinically rich guide.

"The author of Doing Supportive Psychotherapy set out to address a paradox: although conducting psychotherapy is one of the most intimate and exciting things a mental health professional can do, many textbooks on the subject are dull, with formal, stilted dialogue between patient and therapist which prompts the question,'Does anyone really talk like that?'This text was designed to be different. In a dynamic, informal style, the book draws the reader in, providing the essential building blocks that are both applicable to any mental health discipline and compatible with any type of psychotherapy. The dozens of case examples presented were taken from actual cases and illustrate a full range of interactions from the excellent to the seemingly ineffective: all have instructional value. Likewise, the dialogue between therapist and patient is conversational in a realistic way, sometimes eloquent, sometimes not. This approach gives the reader a true sense of the scope of the therapeutic interaction. In addition, the underlying structure of the book is logical and easy to grasp, beginning with the evolution of supportive psychotherapy and ending with a chapter on termination. • The principles of learning to do a psychodynamic formulation are outlined in a step-by-step fashion, making it easy to learn, progress, and practice. The concepts and techniques explored throughout the book are grounded in the psychotherapy literature, and evidence-based research is cited where relevant. The book emphasizes that psychotherapy is an inexact science, therapists are human, and the process of therapy is a journey that is constantly changing rather than static. This approach reassures the reader, who feels supported in a 'holding environment' while learning psychotherapy. The text is short and sweet, designed to teach essentials and include just enough to get clinicians started in supportive psychotherapy. Although the text is targeted at readers on the path toward becoming psychotherapists (social workers, family counselors, psychologists, and psychiatrists), those who don't conduct psychotherapy will find it an essential tool for learning how to understand patients as well as for learning strategies and techniques for keeping a good therapeutic alliance (which inevitably translates into good medication compliance). Doing Supportive Psychotherapy is a brief, spirited book, which functions as both instructional text and paean to psychotherapy. In vigorous, personal prose, the author leaves readers with the message that they are not alone as they venture into the overwhelmingly complex, perplexing, and yet totally wonderful endeavor of the talking cure.".

Updated for the first time since 1993 -- and still the only comprehensive clinical guide to supportive psychotherapy -- this new edition of Clinical Manual of Supportive Psychotherapy features updated and new chapters, vignettes, tables, and resources that reflect current best practices. Where once it was reserved for use with severely impaired patients, supportive therapy has come to be recognized as the treatment of choice for many patients, and supportive techniques underpin a great many other psychotherapies. As a result, the academic literature, both on specific populations and on technical issues, has mushroomed. In this manual, the authors -- all of them practicing mental health clinicians -- distill the most relevant information that nonpsychiatric physicians, psychiatric residents, and experienced psychiatrists and psychotherapists need to fully understand this specific modality. The volume introduces, in Part I, readers to the history and evolution of the use of supportive therapy, examining both its principles and its techniques. It then applies, in Part II, the approach to a range of disorders, including schizophrenia and hallucinations, mood disorders, personality disorders, and -- new to this edition -- anxiety and co-occurring disorders. Part III covers interactions and special settings, discussing applying supportive techniques with medically ill patients and older patients, including tackling issues such as social and financial barriers to seeking treatment in the case of the latter. Also included in this part are new chapters on interactions and special settings, including practicing in detention and correctional centers and the special needs of therapists in public institutions, and updated chapters on community and family involvement and medication adherence and therapy interactions. A discussion of ethics -- augmented with guidance on cultural and religious sensitivity -- completes this most comprehensive of guides.

For many patients, supportive therapy is the treatment of choice, and for many others, the use of medications or of more expressive techniques optimally occurs in the context of a supportive relationship. Yet, there is a paucity of literature expressly devoted to the techniques and aims of supportive psychotherapy. In A Primer of Supportive Psychotherapy, Henry Pinsker remedies this situation by focusing directly on the rationale for, and techniques of, supportive psychotherapy. He explores this modality as a form of dyadic intervention quite distinct from expressive psychotherapies, and also shows how, to varying extents, supportive psychotherapy makes use of patterns of relationships and behavior, past and present. Pinsker's writing is wise, human, and direct. The realities, ironies, conundrums, and opportunities of the therapeutic encounter are vividly portrayed in scores of illustrative dialogues drawn from actual treatments. Destined to become the classic introductory work in the field, A Primer of Supportive Psychotherapy will be valued by students and trainees in all mental health disciplines--and by their teachers--for its wealth of practical guidelines and explicit instruction on how to develop, maintain, and make optimal therapeutic use of a supportive relationship. Psychopharmacologists, counselors, nurse practitioners, and primary care physicians are among the helping professionals who will likewise benefit from Pinsker's clear presentation of the principles of supportive work. Beyond its didactic value, this text will be an indispensable conceptual touchstone for any clinician interested in understanding more clearly the differences among various interventional modalities as a preliminary step in optimal treatment planning.

The book provides clinical vignettes to show how to establish and maintain a positive therapeutic alliance, understand and formulate patients' problems, and set realistic treatment goals. Other chapters discuss the efficacy of supportive psychotherapy, crisis intervention, special populations, and the criteria used to determine competency.

First published in 1989. This volume reflects the extensive experience of a clinician-educator in psychiatry and psychoanalysis. Dr. Werman presents a balanced, comprehensive, detailed, nondoctrinaire, and warm human treatment of the subject. He makes it clear that, while supportive psychotherapy can and should be based on psychodynamic understanding of patients, the technical principles that guide application of such understanding in supportive treatment are quite different from those guiding insight oriented therapy. Careful reflection upon the text and its many clinical examples will suggest that good supportive psychotherapy is extremely difficult and demanding of special skills.

Mastering the art of supportive psychotherapy demands years of training and experience -- and Learning Supportive Psychotherapy: An Illustrated Guide paves the way. The text follows one of the three formats now required for psychiatry residency training by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACGME).