Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: A Review of Efficacy and Effectiveness Studies

Having seen a patient and having carried out diagnostic assessment on both a phenomenological and a psychodynamic level, psychodynamically oriented clinicians have to decide what kind of treatment they recommend to a patient. For this reason, it is useful for them to know which treatment approach has been shown to be effective in the treatment of the respective disorder. In this chapter, a review of the efficacy and effectiveness of psychodynamic psychotherapy is given. First, randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of psychodynamic psychotherapy in specific mental disorders are reviewed. After that, effectiveness studies of long-term dynamic therapy are presented. Studies of psychodynamic psychotherapy published between 1960 and 2006 were identified by a computerized search using MEDLINE, PsycINFO, and Current Contents. In addition, textbooks and journal articles were used. These keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.