The Model
The Brief Strategic Therapy Model
Brief Strategic Therapy represents a revolution in the field of psychotherapy, and treatment and research is oriented towards practical, brief, effective, efficient and replicable solutions for all major psychological and relational disorders. Brief Strategic Therapy demonstrates that, even though human problems and suffering, can be persistent, complicated and painful, the solutions to these difficulties do not necessarily require an equally prolonged and complicated solution.
Due to the seminal work of The Mental Research Institute, Palo Alto, California in the early 1950’s, the interactional and family systems-based model of treatment was born. The original Brief Therapy Model of the 1970’s, that MRI group represented, was fundamentally informed by anthropologist Gregory Bateson, Paul Watzlawick, Don D. Jackson and John Weakland and their thinking was outlined in the groundbreaking book, The Pragmatics of Human Communication, (Norton Books, 1967).
It was down to the work conducted by Paul Watzlawick that the theoretical principles of therapeutic communication have been deepened and systematized (Pragmatics of Human Communication, 1967) and later evolved by Giorgio Nardone, Italy, with the first specific treatment protocols for phobias, compulsions, obsessions, panic attacks and hypochondria these providing the most effective and rapid therapy for such pathologies in our field.
The same empirical-experimental research method of ‘knowing through changing’ was later applied to eating disorders such as anorexia, bulimia and vomiting. This result was not only the production of effective protocols for treating these pathologies, but also in a new understanding of how these problems functioned and how they could be differentiated. The strategic origins of this approach lie in the ancient traditions of Hellenic sophistry and rhetoric and the use of the Chinese art of the stratagem.
These often-forgotten aspects of human ingenuity, practical wisdom and brilliance, created the art of solving apparently unsolvable situations through the use of practice, strategy, suggestion, persuasion and effective communication. The clinical efficacy and effectiveness of this model has been tested through 15 years of clinical outcome research by Dr. Gibson and Dr Portelli of The OCD Clinic®.
Brief Strategic Therapy is therefore a “change oriented” treatment that adopts an advanced communicational approach and exploits the use of non-ordinary or unconventional logic to treat these complex pathologies. From the very first session, our training in Strategic Clinical Dialogue allows the clinician to create rapid change, leading the client to begin to discover, those corrective emotional experiences that change their perception of their problem, which leads to the change they desire in their behavior and in their relationships.
Effective Treatment
The efficacy and efficiency of this therapy in unsurpassed and each therapeutic intervention, can be seen as ‘therapy as research’ thus contributing to the development and fine-tuning of the treatment protocols for different pathologies. This renders the Brief Strategic Psychotherapy model more effective, efficient, predictive, repeatable and teachable.
Effective Outcomes & Therapist Competence
The efficacy of this treatment for OCD pathologies shows that between 86%, and 95% of cases have been solved (that is with a complete overcoming of the patient’s disorder), with treatments averaging on only 7 sessions in the four phases of treatment. The data obtained has been measured with internationally recognized criteria for verifying results in psychotherapy, as repeated follow-up to a year from the conclusion of the therapy.
