How do you work in psychotherapy to adapt to each patient?

If there is something that characterizes psychotherapy, it is its ability to adapt to many types of problems and difficulties. At the end of the day, in the psychologist's office, the patient and the professional address very different experiences: cases of phobias, low self-esteem, relationship crisis, extreme perfectionism, depression, learning disorders... All these phenomena are reflected through symptoms and very varied forms of discomfort, and that cannot be solved by applying the same "recipes".

However, it is not surprising that psychologists adapt to each particular case; His work consists of studying the particularities of the patient and her way of life, and on the other On the other hand, both the way of thinking and behaving of people is necessarily plural and flexible. Everyone thinks, feels and lives life in their own way.

However, within the ability of psychologists to adjust their services to each reason for consultation and specific patient, there are more versatile intervention modalities than others.

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How do you adapt to the problems of each patient in psychotherapy?

All psychologists specialized in psychotherapy dedicate the first part of the therapeutic process get to know your patient better and what has led you to seek professional help. This is achieved through dialogue, and by taking measures so that the person who has come to the consultation (or who uses the psychologist through the format of online therapy by video call) you can relax and adopt an attitude of honesty, knowing that you can express yourself without fear and that you will not be judged.

This first phase of information gathering is crucial to be able to help the person, but by itself it is insufficient. In the first place, it is necessary to transform that accumulated information into a working hypothesis, and secondly, there is to share it with the patient and apply a personalized intervention program in order to give solution.

How to do it? At this point, there are two great options. One is to start from a psychotherapy paradigm and analyze the information from that prism to first make a description of the problem to be addressed, then create a hypothesis of the elements that cause the patient's problem, and finally propose solutions. This implies allowing the information provided by the patient to be transformed by the explanatory scheme of that paradigm, and that the objective to be achieved is also expressed in very particular terms, associated with that theoretical-practical orientation (for example, the cognitive-behavioral model).

The other option is do not adhere to a single paradigm and focus on solving the problems the patient complains about, without allowing these to be totally re-interpreted by a specific framework of interpretation. In this way, the psychologist can combine various theoretical and practical resources to describe the problem without conceptual limitations and approach it without procedural limitations. This is the basis of what is known as integrative psychotherapy.

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What is integrative psychotherapy?

As its name suggests, integrative psychotherapy is a model of psychological therapy in which emphasis is placed on the need to combine and make compatible various intervention techniques and strategies to "integrate" them in a solution designed tailored to the patient, from a philosophy characterized by pragmatism.

Instead of ascribing to a specific paradigm and making the case raised by the patient fit into it, integrative psychotherapy invites us to take a step back, adopt a point a general and broader view of the problem, and combine resources to best fit the characteristics of the person, their life context, their expectations, etc.

So that, avoid falling into theoretical limitations, using in each case the techniques and solutions that have shown greater effectiveness for that specific type of problem. For this reason, integrative psychotherapy is characterized by its heterogeneity and the plurality of resources to which it gives access.

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Do you want to learn more about integrative psychotherapy?

If you are a psychologist or psychologist and you are interested in training in the theory and practice of integrative psychotherapy, Mensalus courses and postgraduate courses are for you. In our psychological and psychiatric assistance center we offer training options both online and in person.

On the one hand, the Master in Integrative Psychotherapy It lasts one school year and its 12th edition begins on September 27, 2021. It can be done at the Institut Mensalus center, located in Barcelona, ​​or from home through direct connections with the classroom. It includes practical exercises and observation sessions and participation in therapy with real patients, under the supervision of the center's professionals. Upon completion, it grants students a University Degree from the Nebrija University of Madrid.

On the other, the Online Postgraduate Professionalizer in Integrative Psychotherapy It lasts 6 months and begins on October 25, 2021. This training program is 100% online and gives the possibility of observing real cases of therapeutic processes through supervisory classes. As with the Master, upon completion it also grants students a University Degree from the Nebrija University of Madrid.

If you would like more information about Mensalus psychotherapy training programs, please contact us.