Psychotherapy and Psychoanalysis

Alumni The site www.nhscareers.nhs.uk/details explains the different modalities within talking therapies including psychoanalytic therapy, behavioural and cognitive psychotherapies, family/couple therapies, humanistic ones and hypno-psychotherapy.

For more information about the various approaches used in psychotherapy, you may find it helpful to visit the Association of Child Psychotherapists (ACP) and the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy (UKCP) websites (see below)

Opportunities also exist in the NHS for psychotherapists to work with adults. Such roles can be found in a range of areas, working with patients with learning disabilities and mental health problems. Multi-disciplinary teams working in these areas will include psychiatrists, mental health nurses, clinical psychologists and a range of therapists (including psychotherapists). Similarly, child psychotherapists also work in specialist CAMHS teams as part of a multidisciplinary team which will usually include a similar range of practitionrers including therapists who are trained in systemic or cognitive therapy as well as psychoanalytic approaches. CAMHS teams work in collaboration with staff from many other children’s services including education and social services.

CAMHS cover all types of provision and intervention from mental health promotion and prevention, specialist services that are based in the community through to very specialist care as provided by in-patient units for young people with mental illness.

There are various places to train to be an adult psychotherapist. The only place for intensive psychoanalytic training is at the Institute of Psychoanalysis

http://www.psychoanalysis.org.uk/training2.htm

Other adult trainings for psychotherapy can be found at the Tavistock and the BAP.

For further information about psychotherapy, contact the following:

Association of Child Psychotherapists
120 West Heath Road
London
NW3 7TU
Tel: 020 8458 1609 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              020 8458 1609       Fax: 020 8458 1482
Email: contactus@childpsychotherapy.org.uk
Website: http://www.childpsychotherapy.org.uk/

UK Council for Psychotherapy
2nd Floor Edward House
2 Wakley Street
London
EC1V 7LT
Tel: 020 7014 9955 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              020 7014 9955       Fax: 020 7014 9977
E-mail: info@ukcp.org.uk
Website: www.psychotherapy.org.uk

British Psychoanalytic Council
Tel: 020 7561 9240 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              020 7561 9240       Email: mail@psychoanalytic-council.org
Website: www.psychoanalytic-council.org
The Royal College of Psychiatrists
17 Belgrave Street
London
SW1X 8PG

Tel: 0207 235 2351 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              0207 235 2351       Fax: 0207 245 1231
Website: www.rcpsych.ac.uk
E-Mail: adean@rcpsych.ac.uk

Testimonial

Alejandra Perez-Corres (MSc PDP Graduate 2001/2002)

Currently works as a Psychoanalyst, a seminar leader (Parent Infant Observation and Psychoanalytic Thought) on the PDP, and a Researcher (Psychoanalytic Consultations)

The MSc Psychoanalytic Developmental Psychology at the Anna Freud Centre was a valuable experience for me. I found the curriculum comprehensive as it combines theory, observational and research work. The theoretical lectures and seminars gave me a good overview of psychoanalytic concepts. I thought the mother-infant, toddler, and nursery observations were not only a source of knowledge about human development but also a worthwhile experience of the powerful unconscious forces at play when two people come together. I found that my efforts to remain an observer helped me to gradually learn to tolerate the anxiety generated by uncertainty and to identify unconscious processes; capacities that are essential in my work as a clinician. The research project at the MSc sparked my interest in attachment theory, an interest that continued through to my PhD work. Conducting the MSc project following a scientific methodology was important as it bestowed on me a basis from which to focus current psychoanalytic research work.