Overcoming the Challenges of Borderline personality Disorder with Schema Therapy Interventions

Speaker

Dr. Joan Farrell

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Date & Time

November 23, 2023 - 11:00am - 1pm ET

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Type

Virtual (Zoom Video)

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Brief Overview 

This webinar provides an overview and demonstration of the Schema Therapy interventions for the treatment challenges BPD clients present. It reviews the eight main challenges BPD patients present for practitioners and the ways in which schema therapists work with them. These challenges include the schema activation therapists encounter in working with BPD patients. The ST interventions presented include: imagery rescripting, development of the client’s internal “Good Parent” and interventions to deal with flashbacks, avoidance, detachment and dissociation. The webinar will include case examples of clients successfully treated with schema therapy. 

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Group and individual ST treatment has demonstrated its effectiveness for BPD in a series of randomized controlled trials (Geisen-Bloo, et al., 2006; Farrell, Shaw & Webber, 2009; Arntz, et al., 2023). ST goes beyond symptom reduction to improve the lives of patients with BPD. Jeffrey Young, Ph.D., the founder of ST states : “Other treatments for BPD, such as Dialectical Behavior Therapy, have also led to more effective coping skills and a significant reduction in self-harm, however, with Schema Therapy patients are, in addition, breaking free of lives of pain, self-hatred, and emptiness, making deeper personality changes, and significantly improving the quality of their lives.” 

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Biography 

Joan is a licensed clinical psychologist with 40 years of experience in training and psychotherapy practice. She is a certified Schema Therapy Trainer/Supervisor and co-directs the Schema Therapy Institute Midwest- Indianapolis. Joan has given training in individual and group ST internationally for over 20 years (24 countries to date). She receives outstanding evaluations for her enthusiastic and collaborative teaching style that includes demonstrations and group role play experiences for participants. 

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Joan is an Adjunct Professor in Clinical Psychology at Indiana University-Purdue University. She was a clinical professor at Indiana University School of Medicine (IUSM), for 25 years. She is Research and Training director of the IUSM Center for Borderline Personality Disorder Treatment & Research. She was the elected Executive Board Member, Coordinator for Training & Certification of the ISST 2012-2018. She chairs the ISST Training & Certification Advisory Board. She was awarded an Honorary Lifetime membership by ISST 2018.

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She developed with Ida Shaw a group treatment model consistent with Schema Therapy. Influenced by clinical experience with BPD and by the work of Jeff Young, they adapted ST interventions and limited reparenting to a group and developed uniquely group interventions to accomplish ST goals. They established outpatient group ST (GST) in a specialty clinic for BPD, which was awarded an Indiana Governor’s Showcase Award in Mental Health. They developed an inpatient ST program that combines individual and group modalities and directed a dedicated BPD ST unit for twelve years at a IUSM-affiliated psychiatric hospital. Their GST model was evaluated in a randomized controlled trial with a grant award from the US National Institute of Mental Health. GST demonstrated strong effects in reduced BPD symptoms and improved global function as well as high recovery rates. Joan was co-Principal investigator with Arnoud Arntz for an international trial with 495 patients in five countries to further evaluate the GST model.

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She is the author with Ida Shaw of three books on ST: Group Schema Therapy for BPD, Wiley, 2012; The Schema Therapy Clinician’s Guide, Wiley, 2014 and Experiencing Schema Therapy from the Inside-Out: A Self-Practice/Self-Reflections Workbook, Guilford Press, 2018 and a DVD Set demonstrating GST (IVAH, 2011). She has contributed many book chapters and research articles on Schema Therapy. Her latest book is with Wendy Behary is The Deliberate Practice of Schema Therapy, APA Press 2023.