Generalized anxiety disorder: should applied relaxation be the first line psychological treatment?
4th April 2010
I recently looked again at Professor Michel Dugas's interesting work on Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) at Concordia University, Montreal. On his Anxiety Disorders Lab website he writes: "Over the past 17 years, I have conducted clinical research on the psychological processes involved in the etiology of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD). …
Recent research: articles from March journals
1st April 2010
I read a lot of research. When I find an article of particular interest I download it to my bibliographic database - EndNote - which currently contains over 14,100 abstracts. Every few weeks I scan through all the articles I've found interesting in the previous month (in the general areas …
Gratitude and dedication
15th March 2010
On the 15th March 2010 my dear, precious mother Edie Hawkins died. She was 97 and I'm writing this post ten days later. After the funeral, after the flurry of forms and arrangements and visits and paperwork have quietened down. I woke early this morning. Thought about her. A sense …
Recent research: articles from February journals
25th February 2010
I read a lot of research. When I find an article of particular interest I download it to my bibliographic database - EndNote - which currently contains over 14,000 abstracts. Every few weeks I scan through all the articles I've found interesting in the previous month (in the general areas …
Interpersonal group work 2
22nd February 2010
See the earlier blog post "Interpersonal group work 1" for comments and handouts particularly orientated to pre-group assessment. It's usually time very well spent, orientating would-be participants to what interpersonal process groups are likely to involve. This both speeds up the time it takes new group members to start engaging …
Developing a training course: life skills for stress, health & wellbeing
19th February 2010
Last Spring, I went walking and camping in Glen Affric. Amongst other things, being away on my own in the hills gave me a chance to think creatively. Once I was back I wrote a blog post about developing a next generation stress management course. I said "I've known for …
Recent research: six studies on management, health messages, behavioural activation, ACT, expressive writing, and wellbeing
18th February 2010
Here are mixed bag of psychotherapy-relevant studies. Foy & colleagues' meta-analysis highlights the value to patients/clients of having good communication between their primary care physician and their mental health professional. The second paper I mention - free full text - by Mollen et al is a bit of a wake-up …
Interpersonal group work 1
15th February 2010
Here are a set of handouts and questionnaires that I often use when I'm running interpersonal process groups. As the "Group therapy background information" leaflet (see below) comments: "Group therapy simply means that therapeutic work is done in groups rather than one-to-one. Many different types of therapy have been tried …
Our life stories: needs, beliefs & behaviours
14th February 2010
This post describes the "Needs, beliefs & behaviours" diagrams, best viewable on screen in PDF format (slides 1 & 2 and slides 3 & 4), but also downloadable in Powerpoint format (slides 1 & 2 and slides 3 & 4). The post below is downloadable as a Word format handout. …
Vitamin D deficiency - again!
11th February 2010
This blog post is also downloadable as a Word format handout. The cover picture on January 16th's British Medical Journal is of a blazing sun with the words "Vitamin D deficiency" underneath it. Inside there is a major review by Pearce and Cheetham entitled "Diagnosis and management of vitamin D …