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E-Therapy for Agoraphobia?
by Stephen Price
Can a software program treat agoraphobia as well as a
live therapist?
Well, E-therapy for
agoraphobia is now available. “Beating the Blues” is an
interactive software program that provides
cognitive-behavioral therapy for sufferers of anxiety and
depression. “FearFighter” is another form of cognitive
behavioral e-therapy for people with anxiety disorders and
phobias.
To give you a quick
review before describing the software, cognitive-behavioral
therapy, or CBT, is the most effective treatment for
agoraphobia according to research. It is a combination of
cognitive and behavioral approaches to therapy.
Cognitive therapy focuses on identifying and correcting
irrational thought patterns. In behavior therapy, a person
with agoraphobia learns to face feared situations instead of
avoiding them through one of two types of exposure therapy. The
person can practice exposure to feared settings in small
steps (as in systematic desensitization) or all at once (as
in flooding).
Developed in the UK, Beating the
Blues is designed to be
a first-line treatment
option for anxiety and depression, similar to live therapy.
It is to be considered before medication. Right now it is
not available for sale online, it is only available through
health care professionals in the UK, US, Canada and
Australia.
Beating the Blues uses
interactive modules, animations and voice-overs to motivate
and engage the user. A major feature is a series of filmed
case studies of fictional patients who model the symptoms of
anxiety and depression and help demonstrate the treatment by
cognitive behavioral therapy.
During the 8-session program,
users identify specific problems and realistic treatment
goals. They work through cognitive modules which focus on
the identification and challenge of automatic thoughts,
thinking errors, distractions, core beliefs, and attributional styles.
Interwoven with these cognitive
elements are problem-directed behavioral components where
patients can work on any two of activity scheduling, problem
solving, graded exposure, task breakdown, or sleep management
according to their specific problems. The final module looks
at action planning and relapse prevention.
FearFighter is available online, but only to users who are
registered with health professionals in the UK. It offers
cognitive-behavioral treatment for anxiety and panic
disorders, phobias, obsessive-compulsive disorder,
depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.
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