Discussion – The Effectiveness of CBT for Depression
Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) is a popular and common therapeutic approach that has been of great importance in many human problems. It is a class of interventions that share the explicit and basic premise that the application of cognitive factors maintains psychological distress and mental disorders. Its central core premise holds that maintenance of behavioural problems and emotional pain is possible through maladaptive cognitions that play a significant play role in ensuring better measures and treatment methods are used for the case. Studies have revealed that Cognitive behaviour therapy acts as the best treatment method for depression and provides exceptional advantages to patients who may benefit from it in different in the same ways. However, although depression may be viewed as a severe mental disorder that exposes people to substantial impairment and distress, CBT has proved efficient in its control and prevention without increased health complications. This paper aims to critically discuss the effectiveness of Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) for depression.
Depression is one of the most debilitating and typical of psychiatric disorders. It can be defined as both a disorder and a syndrome. According to Forbes et al. (2010), as a syndrome, depression involves episodes of loss of interest, sadness, decreased motivation,
pessimism, changes in sex interest, appetite, sleep, impulses, and suicidal thoughts. On the other hand, as a disorder, it is characterized by two types, the bipolar and the unipolar. The differences between the two give the condition its manic episodes, thus requiring proper attention to address it. For instance, bipolar is characterized by uncontrolled muscles, recklessness, irritability or euphoria, grandiosity, and sleeplessness. The lifetime prevalence of clinical depression has been estimated at seventeen per cent as the morbidity rates and suicide risk is revealed to be on the higher side. Most patients with clinical depression disorders experience changes that last longer than expected, although others heal automatically without being exposed to any form of treatment. According to Unwin et al. (2016), cognitive behavioural therapy has a medium effect size that is adversely relative to different control conditions that range from nonspecific controls to the absence of treatment. However, this effect differs significantly based on the waitlist to which it is exposed to. Studies have thus found that at different levels of application in the life of the affected person, CBT can restore high-quality experience. According to Brown et al. (2016), in terms of assortment, CBT provides exceptional psychotherapies that will include better ways through which the treatment method can be applied and its usefulness released based on the implications that it can have on the affected person. Cognitive-behavioral therapy also has a limited effect on individual patients and, in most cases, subjective to the main problem. It also usually works better in the provision of active medications that are of great significance in severe cases.
The treatment of depression collaborative research program (TDRCP) was the primary treatment method that was applied to severe depression to compare with CBT. Although the outcome portrayed an insignificant difference, it was evident that CBT was more effective than the latter. For instance, among the patients with severe depression who have been exposed to CBT application, the result was explicit and constant based on the size and consistency of the application. Subsequent trials in placebo-controlled experiments have also revealed that cognitive therapies are more efficient and effective as compared to the rest of the closely health-related claims. Zoellner et al. (2011), in their study, have revealed that CBT does not have numerous side effects on patients’ severe cases. Although it is unclear about the level of professionalism that is needed for one to ensure the proper application of CBT, studies have revealed that continuous application of the measure in an accorded manner provides that the condition is categorically and efficiently addressed based on the intended outcome. In the treatment, the virtue of implementing processes or efforts to correct errors in thinking has remained the absolute significance of CBT on depression. The cognitive theory maintains that maladaptive information processing and negative automatic thought proclivities play a vital role in the maintenance and aetiology of depression. To the extent through which the CBT approach is right, studies have revealed that it does not drive changes in symptoms and other subsequent freedom that can be realized in relapse cases over the available contributions and exposures that such conditions can expose patients to (Pirnia et al. 2019). CBT implores the treatment is nonspecific. It focuses on restoring credible outcomes that is never doubtful and ensures that they are in line with other treatment methods that might be of great importance.
According to Oud et al. (2017), depression is one of the chronically recurrent disorders that are common among people. Although other measures provided better prevention measures, they have been dammed ineffective as a sizeable number of symptoms will still be realized even if the application was well done. CBT has, however, ensured that better results are obtained across the entire application. It has an enduring effect that is more than purely palliative. Whether cognitive behavioural therapy is truly curative depends on the length of its enduring impact and the extent to which it treats other subsequent cases. Evidence reveals that the enduring effects of CBT can last longer than the treatment itself, thus serves a remedy in case the condition can be realized in the future. However, among patients whose response to acute treatment may be low after the administration of various methods, the CBT application remains the bravest and most effective method that can be adopted for credibility and use. A pair f of recent studies have revealed that the magnitude of the enduring effects of CBT can keep the patient in a stable condition for approximately two to three years. As a result, it makes patients respond slowly to other imperative cases that might hinder the quality of their lives.
In most acute treatments, CBT has provided insightful outcomes that are not subject to any form of biasing differential mortality effects so long as all patients receive similar acute-phase treatment. As seen among most patients, depression is a chronic condition and may resurface if no better treatment is applied. However, the application of CBT has ensured that relapse rates are reduced and all other subsequent recurrences that are relative to ADM among patients with residual depressive symptoms. CBT reduces rates of relapse that are associated with other mild conditions and ensures that a better remedy is found that is capable of relieving a patient from further effects. The enduring impact of CBT among patients with severe depression cases also shows that additional treatment mode results in rates of relapse that are significantly lower than the treatment-as-usual itself. In another study, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy (MBCT) has a similar impact on treating a patient with cognitive cases; the MBCT group holds that combining CBT with other meditation techniques is a practical approach that can quickly relieve a patient from depression cases.
As a result, it is worth noting that although different depression treatment modes have been initiated, the enduring effect of CBT has remained the most useful one for the condition.
Moreover, in addition to the acute CBT treatment ensuring effect, keeping patients in CBT after their initial response to the treatment makes them irresponsive to the next possible cause of depression. CBT acts as a continuation of treatment method that not only aims at ensuring credible therapy for acute depression conditions but also provides that such a condition does not recur again. As a continuation treatment, CBT ensures that at any stage of the depressive state, a patient is capable of being treated without necessarily adhering to other treatment plans that might hinder their stability. Categorically, CBT has proved efficient in conditions where the distinction between recurrence and relapse has become an appointment of concern. Bipolar disorder is associated with lasting impacts on the lives of people and, in most cases, exposes them to extreme conditions (Pfeiffer et al., 2020). However, the application of CBT has proved efficient and ensured that the situation is addressed based on its needed results (Uchendu & Blake, 2017). As opposed to other detrital impacts, CBT focuses on teaching better skills that can be applicable in coping with prodromal and disruption of routines, which contribute to the onset of episodes of bipolar disorder. In multi-model treatment delivery for depression symptoms, CBT has also proved more effective and efficient than any other treatment method. The intervention and care provisions that have been evident in the methods are incredibly useful as compared to other primary care treatments.
In conclusion, cognitive behavioural therapy has served as the most valuable remedy for depression among many patients. In the treatment, the implementation process of CBT aims at correcting all possible errors that might be incurred as a result of depression. Cognitive-behavioral therapy has also been found as the most effective treatment and control of depression. When adequately implemented, the approach can also be used as an adjunct to different medications that are being used for the treatment of bipolar disorders. Categorically, CBT reduces recurrence or relapse rates with a higher magnitude that is of more significant impact on the patients. It also employs more lifesaving approaches that have limited side effects.
References
Brown, G. K., Karlin, B. E., Trockel, M., Gordienko, M., Yesavage, J., & Taylor, C. B. (2016). Effectiveness of cognitive-behavioral therapy for veterans with depression and suicidal ideation. Archives of suicide research, 20(4), 677-682.
Forbes, D. et al. (2010). A guide to guidelines for the treatment of PTSD and related conditions. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 23, 537-52.
Ljótsson, B., Hedman, E., Mattsson, S., & Andersson, E. (2017). The effects of cognitive-behavioural therapy for depression are not falling: A re-analysis of Johnsen and Friborg (2015).
Oud, M., De Winter, L., Vermeulen-Smit, E., Bodden, D., Nauta, M., Stone, L., … & Engels, (2017). Effectiveness of CBT for children and adolescents with depression: a systematic review and meta-regression analysis. European Psychiatry, 57, 33-45.
Pfeiffer, P. N., Pope, B., Houck, M., Benn-Burton, W., Zivin, K., Ganoczy, D., … & Abraham, M. (2020). Effectiveness of Peer-Supported Computer-Based CBT for Depression Among Veterans in Primary Care. Psychiatric Services, app-ps.
Pirnia, B., Pirnia, K., Bazyari, K., Aslani, F., & Malekanmehr, P. (2019). Physical or Psychological Therapy? Cognitive Behavioral Therapy or Acupuncture for Subsyndromal Depression among Methamphetamine Users. Iranian Journal of Public Health, 48(3), 561.
Uchendu, C., & Blake, H. (2017). Effectiveness of cognitive-behavioural therapy on glycaemic control and psychological outcomes in adults with diabetes mellitus: a systematic review and meta‐analysis of randomized controlled trials. Diabetic Medicine, 34(3), 328-339.
Unwin, G., Tsimopoulou, I., Kroese, B. S., & Azmi, S. (2016). Effectiveness of cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) programs for anxiety or depression in adults with intellectual disabilities: A review of the literature. Research in Developmental Disabilities, 51, 60-75.
Zoellner, L.A. et al. (2011). Teaching trauma-focused exposure therapy for PTSD: critical clinical lessons for novice exposure therapists. Psychological Trauma: Theory, Research, Practice, and Policy, 3, 300-308.
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Question
Patients are often asked to write their record of their negative thoughts as homework for Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) sessions.
Explain how difficult this task might be for depressed patients.
Identify your culture and ethnicity (MUST BE HISPANIC, LATINO). Describe how negative thoughts are perceived in your culture.
Discuss ways you could increase the likelihood that a depressed patient completes the Automatic Thoughts (See attached) assignment.
At least 500 words ( 2 complete pages of content) formatted and cited in current APA style 7 ed with support from at least three academic sources, which need to be journal articles or books from 2019 up to now. NO WEBSITES allowed for a reference entry. Include doi, page numbers, etc. Plagiarism must be less than 10%.