Group and individual based cognitive behavioural therapy for severe psychiatric disorders: The challenge of complex and comorbid disorders

Abstract

Epidemiological studies suggest that psychiatric comorbidity is widespread and common, and most psychiatric patients could be expected to show comorbid patterns of psychopathology. Since comorbid disorders are regarded as harder to treat and also plays a crucial role for the outcome of psychological treatment, there is of importance to investigate how cognitive behaviour therapy, may be adapted to treat complex and comorbid psychiatric conditions. The aim of this thesis has been to explore the effectiveness of group and individual based cognitive behaviour therapy in treating complex and comorbid psychiatric disorders.

Results suggest that cognitive behaviour therapy seems to make a clinical impact that improves symptoms and functioning of patients in the presence of multiple comorbid conditions, and different patterns of psychiatric comorbidity with high level of severity could be treated effectively using cognitive behaviour therapy both in individual therapy and in a group setting.