Lives Transformed A Revolutionary Method of Dynamic Psychotherapy

The world has long awaited compelling and unmistakable evidence for the validity of dynamic psychotherapy. A review in the present book shows that such evidence has been accumulating over the past ten years. It comes from clinical trials, process research, case studies, and objective physiological measurements concerned with the importance of expressing emotions. This book extends the evidence. It provides an in-depth examination of therapy in action, based on verbatim accounts of the treatment of seven patients by the author, using the technique of Intensive Short-term Dynamic Psychotherapy (at times extending to medium-term). This technique has been shown to be both effective and cost-effective with a wide range of patients, including some who are notoriously resistant to psychotherapeutic intervention. The raw data of psychotherapeutic sessions enables the reader to trace the origin of therapeutic effects, which occur immediately in response to the direct experience of hitherto buried feelings and impulses.

Overture, Technique, Literature -- Overture -- Introduction to the theory and technique of Davanloo’s ISTDP -- The literature: empirical support for Davanloo's ISTDP -- Exposition: Four Detailed Therapies -- The Man Divided -- The Cold-Blooded Businessman -- The Good Girl with Ulcerative Colitis -- The Woman with Dissociation -- General Discussion -- The relation between predictions and actual events -- Aspects of initial evaluation -- Aspects of therapy -- Aspects of outcome -- Recapitulation and Coda -- The present work, traditional dynamic psychotherapy, and psychoanalysis -- Conclusions -- Coda -- Epilogue