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Findings Support Dedicated, Long-Term Psychotherapy

A meta-analysis of 48 years of research on long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy (LTPP) published in the Journal of the American Medical Association today shows that dedicated psychotherapy continuing more than one year or 50 sessions is more effective than shorter term therapies at treating complex mental health problems such as personality disorders or complex depressive and anxiety disorders.

The analysis involved 23 studies of 1053 patients between 1960 and 2008. Overall, results found that patients who received LTPP had "significantly higher outcomes in overall effectiveness, target problems, and personality functioning than shorter forms of psychotherapy" and were on average better off than 96 percent of patients who received other types of care.

However, despite the outcomes noted in this study, LTPP is somewhat controversial and is rarely covered by insurance due to doubts about its cost-effectiveness, given the lasting and comprehensive nature of the treatment.

In August, a separate study showed that psychotherapy sessions and psychiatrists providing psychotherapy had greatly declined between 1996 and 2005. This drop coincided not only with the rise of more effective psychiatric medications, but also changes in insurance policies that made medication evaluations more profitable than the longer psychotherapy sessions supported by today's findings.

ABSTRACT: Effectiveness of Long-term Psychodynamic Psychotherapy