Dr. Allan Abbass (born February 22, 1962) is professor, psychiatrist, and founding Director of the Centre for Emotions and Health [1] at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada.
Dr. Abbass' clinical specialty and research focus is the use of Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy (ISTDP). [2] [3] Dr. Abbass' work has focused on the use of intensive short-term dynamic psychotherapy to diagnose and treat medically unexplained physical symptoms. [4] [5] Dr. Abbass has developed psychotherapy training programs in ISTDP. [6] [7] Dr. Abbass has published clinical trials on the effectiveness of ISTDP [8] [9] [10] and meta-analyses on the effectiveness of ISTDP [11] and Short-term Dynamic Psychotherapy overall. [12] [13] [14] [15] [16]
He has published extensively on the cost effectiveness of ISTDP. [9] [17] [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] He has provided and supported training ISTDP programs in Switzerland, Greece, The Netherlands, Italy, [26] [27] Norway, [28] Sweden, [29] Denmark, [30] Poland, [31] the UK and other countries. [32]
In 2001, Dr. Abbass was awarded The Association of Chairs of Psychiatry of Canada Education Award for Excellence in Education. [33] In 2013, Dr. Abbass was Awarded the Douglas Utting Award [34] in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, in the "Canadian Providing Outstanding Contributions" category, for the recognition and treatment of depression. He was awarded the designation "Distinguished Professor of 2016" by the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Department of Psychiatry. In 2018 he was named The David Malan Visiting professor of psychotherapy at the Tavistock in London, UK and is also visiting professor of psychotherapy at University of Derby, UK. [32] He is a past President of the International Experiential Dynamic Therapy Association.
He is an advisory board member on the American Psychological Association's Unified Psychotherapy project, [35] and is on the scientific committee of the American Psychoanalytic Association. [36] He is faculty of the Norwegian Institute for ISTDP [37] He is on the editorial board of the American Journal of Psychotherapy [38]
He published his first book, Reaching through Resistance: Advanced Psychotherapy Techniques, in 2015. www.allanabbass.com
His second book Hidden from View: Clinician's Guide to Psychophysiologic Disorders was published in 2018 with Dr Howard Schubiner www.unlearnyourpain.com
Dr. Abbass has also published on the use of videotape and videoconference for training in short term psychotherapy. [39] [6]
An avid basketball fan and player, Allan was named one of Canada's top 25 under 19 year old players while in High School. He was named to the Harrison Trimble High School Sports Hall of Fame in 2007. [40] He played university basketball at Ottawa University [41] and Dalhousie University. He has been an investor and board member of the Halifax Hurricanes, the 2016 Champions of the National Basketball League of Canada. [42]
Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is a form of psychotherapy that aims to reduce symptoms of various mental health conditions, primarily depression and anxiety disorders. Cognitive behavioral therapy focuses on challenging and changing cognitive distortions and their associated behaviors to improve emotional regulation and develop personal coping strategies that target solving current problems. Though it was originally designed to treat depression, its uses have been expanded to include many issues and the treatment of many mental health and other conditions, including anxiety, substance use disorders, marital problems, ADHD, and eating disorders. CBT includes a number of cognitive or behavioral psychotherapies that treat defined psychopathologies using evidence-based techniques and strategies.
Psychoanalysis is a set of theories and therapeutic techniques that deal in part with the unconscious mind, and which together form a method of treatment for mental disorders. The discipline was established in the early 1890s by Sigmund Freud, whose work stemmed partly from the clinical work of Josef Breuer and others. Freud developed and refined the theory and practice of psychoanalysis until his death in 1939. In an encyclopedic article, he identified the cornerstones of psychoanalysis as "the assumption that there are unconscious mental processes, the recognition of the theory of repression and resistance, the appreciation of the importance of sexuality and of the Oedipus complex." Freud's colleagues Alfred Adler and Carl Gustav Jung developed offshoots of psychoanalysis which they called individual psychology (Adler) and analytical psychology (Jung), although Freud himself wrote a number of criticisms of them and emphatically denied that they were forms of psychoanalysis. Psychoanalysis was later developed in different directions by neo-Freudian thinkers, such as Erich Fromm, Karen Horney, and Harry Stack Sullivan.
Psychotherapy is the use of psychological methods, particularly when based on regular personal interaction, to help a person change behavior, increase happiness, and overcome problems. Psychotherapy aims to improve an individual's well-being and mental health, to resolve or mitigate troublesome behaviors, beliefs, compulsions, thoughts, or emotions, and to improve relationships and social skills. Numerous types of psychotherapy have been designed either for individual adults, families, or children and adolescents. Certain types of psychotherapy are considered evidence-based for treating some diagnosed mental disorders; other types have been criticized as pseudoscience.
Group psychotherapy or group therapy is a form of psychotherapy in which one or more therapists treat a small group of clients together as a group. The term can legitimately refer to any form of psychotherapy when delivered in a group format, including art therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy or interpersonal therapy, but it is usually applied to psychodynamic group therapy where the group context and group process is explicitly utilized as a mechanism of change by developing, exploring and examining interpersonal relationships within the group.
Borderline personality disorder (BPD), also known as emotionally unstable personality disorder (EUPD), is a personality disorder characterized by a pervasive, long-term pattern of significant interpersonal relationship instability, a distorted sense of self, and intense emotional responses. Individuals diagnosed with BPD frequently exhibit self-harming behaviours and engage in risky activities, primarily due to challenges in regulating emotional states to a healthy, stable baseline. Symptoms such as dissociation, a pervasive sense of emptiness, and an acute fear of abandonment are prevalent among those affected.
Schizoid personality disorder is a personality disorder characterized by a lack of interest in social relationships, a tendency toward a solitary or sheltered lifestyle, secretiveness, emotional coldness, detachment, and apathy. Affected individuals may be unable to form intimate attachments to others and simultaneously possess a rich and elaborate but exclusively internal fantasy world. Other associated features include stilted speech, a lack of deriving enjoyment from most activities, feeling as though one is an "observer" rather than a participant in life, an inability to tolerate emotional expectations of others, apparent indifference when praised or criticized, a degree of asexuality, and idiosyncratic moral or political beliefs.
Cognitive analytic therapy (CAT) is a form of psychological therapy initially developed in the United Kingdom by Anthony Ryle. This time-limited therapy was developed in the context of the UK's National Health Service with the aim of providing effective and affordable psychological treatment which could be realistically provided in a resource constrained public health system. It is distinctive due to its intensive use of reformulation, its integration of cognitive and analytic practice and its collaborative nature, involving the patient very actively in their treatment.
Psychodynamic psychotherapy and psychoanalytic psychotherapy are two categories of psychological therapies. Their main purpose is revealing the unconscious content of a client's psyche in an effort to alleviate psychic tension, which is inner conflict within the mind that was created in a situation of extreme stress or emotional hardship, often in the state of distress. The terms "psychoanalytic psychotherapy" and "psychodynamic psychotherapy" are often used interchangeably, but a distinction can be made in practice: though psychodynamic psychotherapy largely relies on psychoanalytical theory, it employs substantially shorter treatment periods than traditional psychoanalytical therapies. Psychodynamic psychotherapy is evidence-based; the effectiveness of psychoanalysis and its relationship to facts is disputed.
Intensive short-term dynamic psychotherapy (ISTDP) is a form of short-term psychotherapy developed through empirical, video-recorded research by Habib Davanloo.
Treatment-resistant depression (TRD) is a term used in psychiatry to describe people with major depressive disorder (MDD) who do not respond adequately to a course of appropriate antidepressant medication within a certain time. Definitions of treatment-resistant depression vary, and they do not include a resistance to psychotherapy. Inadequate response has most commonly been defined as less than 50% reduction in depressive symptoms following treatment with at least one antidepressant medication, although definitions vary widely. Some other factors that may contribute to inadequate treatment are: a history of repeated or severe adverse childhood experiences, early discontinuation of treatment, insufficient dosage of medication, patient noncompliance, misdiagnosis, cognitive impairment, low income and other socio-economic variables, and concurrent medical conditions, including comorbid psychiatric disorders. Cases of treatment-resistant depression may also be referred to by which medications people with treatment-resistant depression are resistant to. In treatment-resistant depression adding further treatments such as psychotherapy, lithium, or aripiprazole is weakly supported as of 2019.
David Huntingford Malan was a British psychoanalytic psychotherapy practitioner and researcher recognized for his contribution to the development of psychotherapy. He promoted scientific spirit of inquiry, openness, and simplicity within the field. He is also noted for his development of the Malan triangles, which became a rubric in which therapists can reflect upon what they are doing and where they are in relational space at any given moment.
Child psychotherapy, or mental health interventions for children refers to the psychological treatment of various mental disorders diagnosed in children and adolescents. The therapeutic techniques developed for younger age ranges specialize in prioritizing the relationship between the child and the therapist. The goal of maintaining positive therapist-client relationships is typically achieved using therapeutic conversations and can take place with the client alone, or through engagement with family members.
Although modern, scientific psychology is often dated from the 1879 opening of the first psychological clinic by Wilhelm Wundt, attempts to create methods for assessing and treating mental distress existed long before. The earliest recorded approaches were a combination of religious, magical and/or medical perspectives. Early examples of such psychological thinkers included Patañjali, Padmasambhava, Rhazes, Avicenna and Rumi.
The mainstay of management of borderline personality disorder is various forms of psychotherapy with medications being found to be of little use.
Habib Davanloo is a psychoanalyst and psychiatric researcher and working in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, who developed Intensive short-term dynamic psychotherapy(ISTDP). He was Professor of Psychiatry at McGill University and founding editor of the International Journal of Intensive Short-term Dynamic Psychotherapy.
Edward Khantzian was a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Beginning in the 1970s, he developed a progressively more coherent and empirically-grounded self-medication hypothesis of drug abuse, which states that individuals use drugs in an attempt to self-medicate states of distress and suffering.
Andrew J. Gerber is an American psychoanalyst and the current president and medical director of Silver Hill Hospital in New Canaan, Connecticut. His principal interests and research lie in studying the neurobiological bases of social cognition, particularly in relation to autism spectrum disorders and change in response to psychotherapy. He is a member of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, American Psychiatric Association, American Psychoanalytic Association and the Psychoanalytic Psychodynamic Research Society.
Eric M. Plakun is an American psychiatrist, psychoanalyst, researcher and forensic psychiatrist. He is the current medical director/CEO at the Austen Riggs Center in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. Plakun's primary interests include the mental health advocacy, full implementation of the mental health parity law, access-to-care issues, and reducing health disparities; the value of and evidence base for psychosocial treatments and the diagnosis, treatment, longitudinal course and outcome of patients with borderline personality disorder and treatment resistant disorders.
Diana Foșha is a Romanian-American psychologist, known for developing accelerated experiential dynamic psychotherapy (AEDP), and for her work on the psychotherapy of adults suffering the effects of childhood attachment trauma and abuse.
Eclectic psychotherapy is a form of psychotherapy in which the clinician uses more than one theoretical approach, or multiple sets of techniques, to help with clients' needs. The use of different therapeutic approaches will be based on the effectiveness in resolving the patient's problems, rather than the theory behind each therapy.