Conditions for Psychotherapy with Schizophrenics Preliminary Lessons from the Danish Nips Project

Abstract

Proposals for psychotherapy for schizophrenic patients (in the Danish part of the Nordic NIPS project) need a clarification of the conditions offered by the therapy. These conditions pertain to two different types of therapy: a ward-affiliated therapy and a private practice psychotherapy. Particular psychotherapies can then be described in accordance with patterns from each of the two types. The selected patterns are as follows: expressed desire for therapy; contract or free choice of therapist; payment; setting or mental space for therapy; duration of therapy; and frequency of sessions. It is argued that these external criteria can be used to delimit goals for therapy and to outline internal psychic transformations occurring during therapy.