What does DBT involve?

DBT entails three clinical activities: skills group, individual therapy, and telephone consultation.

Skills Group

Participants learn effective coping strategies to be more mindful of current experiences, better regulate emotions, effectively manage interpersonal relationships, and skillfully tolerate emotional distress. Skills group is organized much like a classroom setting. Participants commit to completing daily diary cards and homework assignments.

Individual Therapy

Participants also attend an individual therapy session each week where they learn to evaluate precipitants to their daily distress and apply coping strategies learned in skills group. The participant and the therapist work collaboratively to assess current behaviors, and to develop precise operational definition of treatment targets.

Telephone Consultation

Emphasis is placed on reducing life-threatening, therapy-interfering, and quality-of-life-interfering behaviors, as well as increasing the frequency of effective coping. To this end, EMP therapists are available to participants for phone consultation in order to provide skills coaching outside of regular program hours. Participants learn to apply effective coping strategies to real life situations.