Conditions for the effectiveness of psychoanalytic psychotherapy in the treatment of chronic depression: a comparative case study
(2022) Society for Psychotherapy Research UK conference — Location: Leeds (8.April.2022)
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- Authors
Polipo, Niccolò 
- et. al.
- Abstract
- Outcome studies on the psychotherapeutic treatment of depression demonstrate medium effect sizes, but they also reveal substantial variability between individual patients. The Tavistock Adult Depression Study (TADS), a pragmatic randomized controlled trial, has shown that Long-Term Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy (LTPP) can improve the long-term outcome of treatment-resistant depression (Fonagy et al, 2015). In this study, we are interested to know why LTPP is effective in many but not all cases of chronic depression. Therefore, we conducted a case study comparison with matched cases from the TADS. Two cases were selected from the available data, one good outcome and one poor outcome, from the same therapist and matched on a number of demographic variables to maximize comparability. The data (assessment data, session recordings, therapy process data, and outcome data) were analyzed with a mixed-method approach. A psychoanalytic case formulation was made by a psychoanalyst who was blind to the outcome. On the basis of this case formulation, the treatment process was studied through consensual qualitative research for case studies (Jackson et al, 2012). The development of the therapeutic alliance and the use of psychoanalytic interventions were rated with the use of structured rating tools. On the basis of this multi-method approach, we develop a hypothesis about what went wrong in the poor outcome case. Next, the findings from the poor outcome case will be compared with the good outcome case to see whether the necessary conditions for change are present, as we would expect.
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Citations
Willemsen, J., Polipo, N., Rost, F., & et al. (2022). Conditions for the effectiveness of psychoanalytic psychotherapy in the treatment of chronic depression: a comparative case study. Society for Psychotherapy Research UK conference, Leeds. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/107770