The Importance Of Cognitive Therapy

The goal of cognitive therapy is to expose the patient with OCD to the stimuli that bothers them and then teach the patient to respond to the stimuli in a more positive way than their compulsions would incline them to do. One of the most important factors of cognitive therapy is the relationship between the client and the therapist (Phillipson, n.d.). There are multiple aspects of a therapist-client relationship that affect the efficacy of therapy including “1) level of comfort; 2) confidence in the therapist; and 3) a commitment to the treatment process by the client and therapist. The therapeutic relationship is a partnership in the fullest sense of the word” (Phillipson, n.d., para. 2). The relationship between the two determines how successful the therapy is. Cognitive therapy has been proven to be more effective in long-term treatment of OCD than medications. Cognitive therapy can be split up into cognitive conceptualization and cognitive management (Phillipson, n.d.). Cognitive conceptualization “focuses on removing the sense of …show more content…
The study showed that those that participated in group therapy had consistently lower YBSCOs scores. YBSCO is a scale used to determine the severity of OCD and is based off a series of questions. Group exposure and response prevention therapy also proved to be more effective than group cognitive therapy. Most patients that complete treatment will experience a decrease in symptoms of OCD over time (Whittal, Robichaud, Thordarson et al., 2008). In patients doing individual treatment, “CT is as effective as the gold standard psychological treatment, which means that patients and therapists have wider treatment options” (Whittal, Robichaud, Thordarson et al., 2008, p. 1013). Group therapy for the treatment of OCD is a good option because of its cost effectives (Whittal, Robichaud, Thordarson et al.,