Dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) is a longer term cognitive behavioral treatment devised for borderline personality disorder which teaches patients skills for regulating and accepting emotions and increasing interpersonal effectiveness.

Eclectic therapies Many NHS therapists formulate the patient's difficulties using more than one theoretical framework and choose a mix of techniques from more than one therapy approach. The resulting therapy is pragmatic, tailored to the individual. These generic therapies often emphasize important non-specific factors (such as building the therapeutic alliance and engendering hope). By their nature, they are more idiosyncratic and difficult to standardize for the purposed of randomized controlled trials research.

Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) is a form of imaginable exposure treatment for post-traumatic conditions where the traumatic event is recalled whilst the client makes specific voluntary eye movements.

Focal psychodynamic therapy identifies a central conflict arising from early experience that is being re-enacted in adult life producing mental health problems. It aims to resolve this through the vehicle of the relationship with the therapist giving new opportunities for emotional assimilation and insight. This form of therapy may be offered in a time-limited format, with anxiety aroused by the ending of therapy being used to illustrate how re-awakened feelings about earlier losses, separations and disappointments may be experienced differently.

Psychopharmacotherapies are based upon the realization that the brain is not chemically responding in a functional fashion. This has to do with chemicals within the brain and central nervous system called neurotransmitters which must not only exist but exist in balance for thought, emotion and behavior to have regulation. Vigorous research on these chemical agents have existed since the mid 1950s. As a result of this research, we better understand how the brain's function is regulated and how best to assist those who suffer from dysregulation of these neurotransmitters. Acetylcholine and norepinephrine were among the first investigated followed by dopamine (dihydoxyphenylethylamine) and indoleamine serotonin. Quantitatively, these are only minor transmitters in the brian but they serve major roles in emotional behavior. The anticonvulsants, neuroleptics, antidepressants and anxiolytic agents are ever being refined. They are not addictive agents although some patients become dependent upon the anti-anxiety (anxiolytic agents) when they are not prescribed in an appropriate schedule. Non-medical abuse of the anti-anxiety drugs is actually uncommon. These anxiolytic agents were excessively prescribed in the past, and some clinicians became hesitant to prescribe them. Appropriately used, the drugs are both safe and beneficial.

Marital and Sexual Psychotherapies deal with not only environmental, situational and phase of life problems which confront relationships but deal with concurrent problems in communication and conflict. Problems that occur within a relationship often emerge from interactional problems, the nature of feedback which couples provide each other, the difficulties in maintaining functional balance within the relationship, and the struggles for power and control which emerge. While interactional problems within a marital system may result in, and sometimes from, sexual conflicts, these are not the sole causes, nor even necessarily the primary causes. It is quite possible for a couple to have a functional sexual relationship and a dysfunctional emotional relationship. Relationship problems may emerge or worsen as a result of sexual dysfunction. By the time the couple consults a doctors, it is questionable as to whether sole resolution of the sexual problem, via medication for example, will make the marriage again functional unless other intervention (e.g. marital psychotherapy) is concurrently provided.

Short-term dynamic psychotherapies (STDP) work well for nonresistant patients whose resolution of problems do not become steeped in long term transferential problems relating to the doctor and for whom problems are significant but not overwhelmingly complex. Such patients often have some beginning insight or awareness of potential causes of their problems. Treatment begins with a comprehensive diagnostic examination which determines whether the problems/disorder can be appropriately treated by a particular psychotherapeutic technique. The doctor also determines whether the patient has the strength to confront the underlying causes for their problems and that there is the potential for positive response to short term intervention. As in psychoanalysis or psychoanalytic psychotherapies, STDP does involve examination of of the means by which unconscious needs and drives influence a patient's behavior and functional capacity.

Client-centered psychotherapy arose during the period of 1938-1950 and broadened the scope of patients treated by this approach in the 60s and 70s. The characteristics that distinguished this form of patient care included the belief that specific characteristics of the doctor were necessary and sufficient for effective treatment; rejection of the medical/disease model and focus upon the growth model of patient change; the immediate (rather than emotionally distant) accessibility of the doctor; focus upon the experiences of the patient; focus upon the patient's ability to live within the moment; concern for personality change rather than personality structure; and belief that the process applies to all patients rather than a select group; application of all knowledge of the impact of psychotherapy upon the interpersonal process. Many patients reported significant gains after only brief treatment exposure in contrast to the greater time period perceived required by other modes of treatment.

Cognitive Behavioral Psychotherapy is based upon a theory of psychopathology, set of psychotherapeutic principles, and knowledge based upon empirical investigation. It is based upon information-processing theory and social psychology. Aside from being effective with a wide range of disorders, it appears to enhance the impact of medications used to treat such disorders and has appeal in that it is active, structured and time-limited. Pain, phobias, and mood disorders as well as psychophysiologic (psychosomatic) disorders have been treated successfully with this treatment approach. Errors in our thinking leading to self-defeating assumptions, incorrect interpretation of information, and lack of adequate problem solving planning are believed to be at the heart of our problems. Treatment assist the patient in identifying, testing the reality of, and correcting dysfunctional beliefs underlying our thinking and to assist the patient in modifying the thoughts and behaviors which emerge.

Relaxation Techniques in this form of therapy the patient is helped to resolve stresses that can contribute to the particular disorder. Breathing re-training and other skills are taught in which the patient is actively involved in developing skills that are useful for a lifetime. Can take time to achieve results and treatment benefits are limited to active use of the techniques.

continue: Adlerian, Gestalt, Rational-Emotive, Reality Therapy