CarnevaleQuaresima

Community therapy. Focusing on the foreign body. Effects on patients and caregivers

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Abstract

Therapeutic communities are now and have for several decades been used for a wide array of disorders that range from substance abuse to personality disorders, and from subacute to chronic psychosis. These disorders are often intertwined and causes an overly dense diagnostic framework.

It is possible to observe two different perspectives which converge into the therapeutic  community system and allow us to pinpoint two pivotal factors of treatment. The first one, which we could define as individual, privileges the protective and facilitating function of the setting, which tends to be seen as a third element, between patient and caregiver, and therefore such that it can permit a one-to-one relationship that would otherwise be made difficult by the intensity of the transference From another standpoint (1), however, collective and group factors must be stressed, insisting on the Read more

MatissePsicoterapiadiGruppo

Model-scene and Group positions in a group of young chronic psychotic patiens

/in , , /by

Abstract

The authors show the utility of using two important concepts together – the Position Sequence and the Model Scene – in group therapy for young psychotics in a residential institution. [Model scenes are phase-specific metaphors; they persist over time and are referred to repeatedly by the group members]. A transition is observed from an initial position of non-differentiation, to a stage of partial recognition of differences among patients. In this second stage – called “self-reflectiveness position”- the patients begin to ask for appreciation and visibility, and manifest a greater awareness of themselves; this process is necessary to the individual’s development, but very dangerous for the unity of the group. The authors believe that the Model Scene takes on different features and functions, depending on Read more