CBT Coach

Odysseus

Can any of the CBT lads answer this one for me. I seem to be coming acorss the above term a bit. I seen it posted in the LTI forum a few times here. What's the story here, are professional CBT therapists using this term, or is it a development of life coaching, that the "weekend warrior" has started to use to give themselves a different sounding name?

Is it something being used to try take whatever "prejudices" people encounter/fear they may encounter about being in therapy? It just doesn't seem right to me, it would to me take something away from the professionalism of the therapeutic encounter. So what do you guys make of it?

JuliusCaesar

Odysseus wrote: »

Can any of the CBT lads answer this one for me. I seem to be coming acorss the above term a bit. I seen it posted in the LTI forum a few times here. What's the story here, are professional CBT therapists using this term, or is it a development of life coaching, that the "weekend warrior" has started to use to give themselves a different sounding name?

CBT has become very popular; coaching has become popular; why not put the two terms together and be even more popular? I suspect they are coaches who perhaps did a short training in CBT. Accredited CBT therapists will always that that this is what they are - and again, there are only two reputable accrediting organisations for CBT. (The BABCP and the ICP/CBT section.)

Odysseus wrote: »

Is it something being used to try take whatever "prejudices" people encounter/fear they may encounter about being in therapy? It just doesn't seem right to me, it would to me take something away from the professionalism of the therapeutic encounter. So what do you guys make of it?

Well, as long as the profession isn't regulated.....

You'll have to ask the coaches for the rest!

hotspur

Where are you coming across it?

Some pure life coaches use CBT which, whatever you may think of their profession, at least means they're going to be using something evidence-based. CBT techniques are well capable of being learnt by non-mental health professionals and are taught to allied health staff at least in the UK.

I know some psychotherapists who also do life coaching. Why should somebody have to be suffering before they get expert help to improve their life and well being? They shouldn't.

It will become increasingly prevalent over the next few years that "therapy" is not just for the amelioration of distress and psychopathology. Positive psychology is likely to become clinicised (neologism I just created) soon enough and doubtless CBT will play a part in the techniques it uses to enhance life.

I fully expect a new breed of brief positive therapist to emerge that will be some manner of psychologist / psychotherapist / life coach / other therapist focusing on the kind of things that are dealt with by life coaches, complimentary therapists such as hypnotherapists etc.

In an hour of possible delirium last week I was looking at this Masters in positive psychology in London and wondering if I could fly over for each day!
www.uel.ac.uk/psychology/programmes/postgraduate/positive-msc.htm

I'm rambling. Point is, expect to see CBT + coach more and more until we have a new nomenclature.

As for prejudice about being in therapy. I was listening to a podcast today of an interview with Arnold Lazarus talking about how he has worked with very powerful politicians who would only come under the cover of the dark of night, ask him to park his car outside so that they could park in his garage in case anyone spotted their car, insist on no note taking, and cash only no bills. Now if he had been a "coach"...well that would probably mean they were go get 'em types on their way to the top!

JuliusCaesar

hotspur wrote: »

Where are you coming across it?

LTI, he said

hotspur wrote: »

Some pure life coaches use CBT which, whatever you may think of their profession, at least means they're going to be using something evidence-based. CBT techniques are well capable of being learnt by non-mental health professionals and are taught to allied health staff at least in the UK.

However, under the IAPT policy, these people are getting a year's training in a university AND are working under the supervision of accredited CBT therapists. The people doing short courses here are often trained by people who also learned on short courses. Many of these people do not understand the complexities of CBT and regard it as a recipe to be applied to all. When it doesn't work, they go well, tried that, now back to whatever pops into my head. I've found that the people who get on best in understanding CBT are those with prior training in ABA.

hotspur wrote: »

I know some psychotherapists who also do life coaching. Why should somebody have to be suffering before they get expert help to improve their life and well being? They shouldn't.

It will become increasingly prevalent over the next few years that "therapy" is not just for the amelioration of distress and psychopathology. Positive psychology is likely to become clinicised (neologism I just created) soon enough and doubtless CBT will play a part in the techniques it uses to enhance life.

Why do you think CBT students have to apply CBT to themselves during their training?



I fully expect therapy to develop in an evidence-based way, with regulation, and with practitioners being ethical, aware of their limits, and undergoing CPD.

hotspur

JuliusCaesar wrote: »

LTI, he said
However, under the IAPT policy, these people are getting a year's training in a university AND are working under the supervision of accredited CBT therapists. The people doing short courses here are often trained by people who also learned on short courses.

I agree. I think the options for CBT training in Ireland are regrettably limited without our own Lord Layard. There are obviously large numbers of non-psychologist / psychiatrist psychotherapists out there who would benefit from quality CBT training. A 5 day PCI professional certificate isn't really going to cut it.

Apart from Trinity's cognitive therapy programmes there aren't many good options as far as I can tell. I know UCD do a child/adolescent CBT Masters, what else is available unless you go to Belfast (I'm not including an REBT crowd I know)?

Given that more of the APA's division on clinical psychology and NICE's recommendations for empirically supported therapeutic interventions for specific problems with most populations are CBT than any other modality it seems like an unfortunate situation that most psychotherapists in this country don't have good training in it or are likely to anytime soon. As if it should be the preserve of the psychology and psychiatry professions.

How many psychoanalytic courses are out there for people to so primary training in? Ditto for humanistic.

JuliusCaesar wrote: »

I fully expect therapy to develop in an evidence-based way, with regulation, and with practitioners being ethical, aware of their limits, and undergoing CPD.

I agree, and that's the way it should be. But notice I put the "" around the word therapy. I was making the point that there is a need for a type of professional who is not a traditional therapist as they now exist and yet not a yahoo for brief positive life changes. There would be a wealth of difference between such a professional doing MI or CBT to help someone lose weight or quit smoking and a traditional therapist using CBT for depression or an anxiety disorder.

There's something I've wondered about with the ICP's CBT group. Are they a disparate group of CBT practitioners? Within the other groups you can see the training and accrediting organisations (not sure about the constructivists now I come to think of it), how much of a cohesive group are they do you know?

JuliusCaesar

hotspur wrote: »

There's something I've wondered about with the ICP's CBT group. Are they a disparate group of CBT practitioners? Within the other groups you can see the training and accrediting organisations (not sure about the constructivists now I come to think of it), how much of a cohesive group are they do you know?

What do you mean by disparate? There are not a lot of CBT therapists in the country and most of them would know each other I suppose. But there is only one CBT association in the ICP. As I've said there are only 2 accrediting bodies for CBT - the National Assoc for CBT (which is in the ICP) and the BABCP, which has an Irish (all-Ireland) branch. Both have been going for a long time.

hotspur

JuliusCaesar wrote: »

What do you mean by disparate? There are not a lot of CBT therapists in the country and most of them would know each other I suppose. But there is only one CBT association in the ICP. As I've said there are only 2 accrediting bodies for CBT - the National Assoc for CBT (which is in the ICP) and the BABCP, which has an Irish (all-Ireland) branch. Both have been going for a long time.

By disparate I meant not working collectively to promote CBT in Ireland either in training or to the public as a therapy of choice. The National Association for CBT has no public presence, not even a website that I know of.

Maybe I'm being too harsh, but think of a non psychology/psychiatry person starting off on their training to become a psychotherapist. In order to get any kind of CBT training worth having they are going to have to wait until they are qualified and working first. That's a lot of humanistic / person centred / psychoanalytic / whatever other modality to have to train in before getting a chance to learn CBT.

I'm just not convinced it ought to be a postgraduate specialisation instead of a an option as a core primary modality.

JuliusCaesar

I think it would lengthen CBT training considerably, especially because it is such an effective therapy for a large number of severe mental disorders. Presently somebody going into CBT training will have a large body of experience in Mental Health under their belt as qualified professionals anyway, so they will be experienced in professional relationships, ethics, and non-directive counselling already.

The problem is that many people who've undertaken the short courses have no ideas of their own limitations (although that's true of some of the other types of therapy out there). There is the potential to do much harm when unqualified (ie not accredited CBT) people take on the treatment of, say, OCD or Bipolar without having much idea of what they are about. I see examples of this in my daily practice.

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

Odysseus

JuliusCaesar wrote: »

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

That's what was in my mind when I posted the question. I had to do a CBCS course through Leeds University a few years. As you know CBT just isn't my thing, I respect others who use that way of working, but it's just not for me clinically. Now that training I have to say was very intensive, but at the end of the day it was one module out of a course Leeds run, our clinical directors wanted us all trained up in it.

On top of that I have studied it at various levels but I would not consider myself a CBT therapist or entitled to call myself one. However, compared to some that I know who name themselves as CBT therapists I have a significant amount of CBT training. I really do get a tad annoyed at the position we have found ourselves with in this country, namely that people can call themselves anything in relation to psychotherapy.

There has to be a lot of people causing damage to client's because of this, and probably making a killing off it as well. I would like to see a situation which prevents people from training, but at the same time we need therapists to be trained to a high standard.

The above is one of the reasons I won't refer a client to another therapist who isn't trained to post-grad level, or at least training at that level. The acceptable in most addiction centers is diploma level, and I see the damage being done on a regular basis, by people over-stepping their position with clients.

I hate sounding like an academic snob, but I see people practicing who can't even read any academic paper. I often told that doesn't matter much because it's all about the therapeutic relationship. Yes it is, fair enough; however, if you practice isn't informed by theory people just get lost. I think our clients deserve a tad better than this.