THE PSYCHOANALYTIC TREATMENT OF SEVERELY DISTURBED AND DIFFICULT PATIENTS: A DAY WITH DR. BERTRAM KARON

Saturday, March 19, 2005

Annual Master Clinician Workshop
Christel DeHaan Fine Arts Center, University of Indianapolis
9 am - 5 pm

Workshop Description
For more than three decades, Dr. Karon has been a major pioneer in the development of our psychoanalytic understanding of difficult patients and complex clinical phenomena. His articulate voice, theoretical acumen, warmth, and compassion have established him as one of the leading psychoanalysts and psychologists working in this often-controversial arena.

In this year's Master Clinician Workshop, Dr. Karon offers participants an integrated psychoanalytic approach to the understanding and treatment of severely disturbed and difficult patients, including schizophrenic, severely depressed, and borderline patients. Drawing on conceptual and empirical literature, he will primarily focus on the clinical applications of this valuable approach.

The morning session will feature two detailed case presentations in order to illustrate representative clinical problems and the psychoanalytic approach to their understanding and treatment. Dr. Karon will present the case of an "incurable" schizophrenic, judged unresponsive to standard care by the inpatient psychiatric staff and scheduled for ECT, who resolved his psychosis with intensive psychoanalytic treatment, and became an internationally distinguished scholar as well as a good husband and father. Dr. Karon will also discuss the treatment of a patient with chronic recurrent depression and panic attacks who was non-responsive to medication but who was permanently cured by the insights gained in three years of psychoanalytic work. The afternoon session will explicate strategic and technical aspects of this therapeutic approach.

Learning Objectives

Participants in this workshop will:

1. Develop an understanding of the psychoanalytic literature relevant to this patient group;
2. Learn techniques for treating delusions, hallucinations, suicidal and homicidal impulses, self-mutilation, and other primitive and difficult symptoms;
3. Learn how to demystify and make less frightening work with psychotic and difficult patients;
4. Develop an effective approach to establishing and maintaining a viable therapeutic alliance with severely disturbed patients.

Bertram P. Karon, Ph. D.

Bertram P. Karon, Ph.D., is a Professor of Clinical Psychology at Michigan State University. Dr. Karon received his A.B. from Harvard and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Princeton. He is a former President of the Division of Psychoanalysis of the American Psychological Association and has over 150 publications, including the book (with VandenBos) Psychotherapy of Schizophrenia: The Treatment of Choice. He was selected by the Washington School of Psychiatry as the 2001 Fromm-Reichmann memorial lecturer, by the U.S. chapter of the International Society for the Psychological Treatment of Schizophrenia and Other Psychoses as their 2002 Award recipient for "profound contributions to our psychoanalytic understanding and humane treatment of patients with severe mental illness." He has also received awards for his contributions to psychoanalytic technique, theory, research, and teaching by the New York Society for Psychoanalytic Training, by the Chicago Center for Psychoanalytic Studies, by the Appalachian Psychoanalytic Society, by the International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology, by the APA Graduate Students Association, and by the APA Division of Psychoanalysis.

Workshop Schedule