Treating Personality Disorders (PDs) effectively is notoriously difficult. There is cause for optimism, though, as a number of emerging psychotherapies specialized to target features of personality pathology have been shown to be more effective than treatment as usual. In contrast, there is a lack of evidence suggesting that such specialized therapies are more effective than general psychiatric management. These observations put the clinician in a difficult position when planning how to treat PDs. The February 2012 issue of the Journal of Personality Disorders presents a number of articles advocating for the integrated treatment of PDs, in which techniques across different empirically supported treatments are selected to target problems unique to each patient presenting with a PD. In an introduction to this special issue, Dimaggio and Livesly (2012) argue that this approach should be superior to any one specialized therapy because no one specialized therapy provides comprehensive coverage of the difficulties experienced by patients with PDs.

Dimaggio, Giancarlo, & Livesley, John. (2012). Introduction to the Special Feature on the Integrated Treatment of Personality Disorder. Journal of Personality Disorders, 26(1), 1-6. doi: 10.1521/pedi.2012.26.1.1

The Personality Project

How should personality disorders be treated?