Types of Services
Psychiatric Diagnostic Evaluations
The beginning of all therapeutic relationships starts with a Psychiatric Diagnostic Evaluation. This first interview session is typically 60-90 minutes and aims to gather an extensive history and to determine treatment recommendations. It is suggested to bring with you or send ahead of time supportive documents for this initial session such as past and recent psychiatric/psychological testing, a list of past and current medications, a history of symptom development and severity, a list of current symptoms, medical history documents, and a summary of your families perception of your diagnostic clinical impact.
Individual Therapy
Individual therapy sessions are one on one sessions to help an individual recognize symptoms, work on treatment oriented strategies, and plan how to maintain gains over time. Sessions run for the traditional 45-minutes and are typically organized once a week. This frequency helps an individual process and work on goals set in each session through the week while still keeping the information fresh. With this in mind, there are many reasons to consider meeting more often or less often than the traditional weekly session. Treatment therapy benefits take time. Some individuals find a significant benefit to being in treatment after the first session, while some individuals take months or years to move toward his/her goals. This is dependent on many factors, some of which are willingness and motivation, symptom severity and complexity, awareness of symptom impact, and diagnostic presentation.
Family or Parent Therapy
Family and Parent therapy/support is an integral part of treatment success and progress. If you are a parent, sibling, grandparent, or significant other it is very important to be able to understand the diagnostic make up of an individual’s symptoms and understand the prescribed treatment model. When it comes to treatment, especially OCD and other related conditions, often what a loved one will do or say to “help” will typically make symptoms worse. Family and parent therapy will help teach and support loved ones of how to respond to symptoms and not enable diagnostic indicators. Further, to support these valuable relationships, it is pivotal for family members to learn how to manage their thoughts, feelings, emotions and words for mutual success. Common topics include psychoeducation about diagnosis and symptoms, treatment strategies and theory, conflict resolution between parents and children, major life transitions, traumatic family experiences, blended family transitions, parent and/or child substance abuse, behavioral issues, and emotional regulation strategies.
Intensive Treatment Programs (ITP)
An Intensive Treatment Program (ITP) is an option for individuals who have tried traditional weekly therapy and have been unable to make significant progress, present with severe symptoms, are potentially at a risk for needing a higher level of care such as hospitalization, or are stepping down from a hospital or higher level of care. ITP length of time varies depending on many factors such as willingness and motivation, symptom severity and complexity, awareness of symptom impact, and diagnostic presentations. It is common to engage in daily treatment (3-4 hours of one on one therapy) for 2-4 weeks, especially when it comes to exposure and response prevention (ERP) for OCD. Treatment typically is at our main offices located in the heart of Palm Beach, and near Miami and Fort Lauderdale (Dade, Broward, and Palm Beach Counties), but we often go out of the office and engage in exposures in “the real world” to help with generalization of skill sets. At-home visits are also a common part of treatment to help with common symptoms that are experienced while only in the home environment. Our short term intensive program will initiate the treatment process and guide individuals through the following steps:
- Symptom recognition,
- Psychoeducation about obsessions, compulsions, and OCD treatment protocols (CBT),
- How to form and use a hierarchy of treatment goals,
- Learning to tolerate discomfort,
- How to recognize OCD verse “normal” behaviors,
- How to generalizing new skill sets at home, and
- How to incorporate family members as therapy treatment allies verse OCD enablers.
Group Therapy
Group therapy can be a wonderful opportunity to meet other individuals with similar symptoms, share therapeutic experiences, and learn to work with others in evidence based treatment enhanced sessions. Groups are typically 90 minutes long and incorporates Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), developing relationships with others, and weekly home based homework and challenges in each session. Special group outings are also a regular option, such as a Fear of Flying group at the airport with a pilot, a group flight, a mall social exposure group, and/or lunch/dinner group. Please reach out to the office if you are interested in attending a regularly scheduled group and we will match you with other individuals with similar symptoms for a specialized group.
Teletherapy (Using VSee or phone sessions)
As technology improves and expectations of on demand treatment evolves, we have made the process of connecting to therapy while not in the office as seamless as possible. Options such as teletherapy (via the phone) and e-therapy/video therapy (via electronic messaging and video chat) are common alternatives to traditional therapy. We use VSee for video sessions, as your confidentiality and security is of upmost importance and VSee is HIPAA/BAA compliant. Teletherapy and video therapy are offered on a case by case basis and are billed at the same standard rate.
Home Visits
Depending on symptoms and presentation, home visits may be an appropriate therapeutic add on to the traditional in-office treatment options. Individuals who commonly present with symptoms at home and not outside of the home (a very common occurrence) can have therapeutic support where their symptoms are most intrusive. Common difficulties include routines in the home, difficulty with contamination, checking, and repeating, and issues with hoarding. The goal of home visits is to support and teach an individual exposure based exercises while helping them generalize these skills and eventually practice them independently.