Cognitive-behavioral treatment for adult survivors of childhood trauma - Mervin R. Smucker

The increasing frequency with which issues of childhood sexual abuse come up in therapy highlights the need for an effective short-term treatment for these patients. Imagery rescripting and reprocessing therapy, the treatment program described in this book, is an information-processing, schema-focused model in which the recurring traumatic abuse memories are treated with a combination of prolonged imaginal exposure and imaginal rescripting. With the use of both imagery and verbal interventions to activate the entire fear memory and to identify, challenge, modify, and reprocess the recurring traumatic imagery and abuse-related beliefs, a more adaptive schema is created. The authors compre-hensively describe this treatment program, offering step-by-step procedures for each session. Models of all verbal instructions and written materials given to the patient are included for easy use or adaptation. Three treatment formats are demonstrated with detailed extended excerpts from actual sessions. This readable and informative book is a significant advance in the treatment of post-traumatic stress syndrome resulting from early childhood abuse.