CBT Essentials Part 2

Welcome to the second instalment of ‘CBT Essentials’ a new mini-series within Forrest Rambles.  Over the next few months I’ll be looking at the building blocks which make up a typical CBT appointment.  I’m hoping this will be of interest to those of you who are curious about CBT and those who want to know more about what to expect from their treatment.  

Last month we looked at setting an agenda for your CBT appointment and I mentioned that mood questionnaires were often a key part of this.  The fancy term for these questionnaires is ‘psychometric measures’ but I find ‘mood questionnaires’ to be much more friendly!

Questionnaires are a tool to measure what your mood has been like recently.  Mood can be a tricky thing to measure as it’s such a personal and subjective experience.  These questionnaires break things down into specific symptoms and have been scientifically tested to ensure they are an accurate measurement.  

When you first meet a therapist they will use mood questionnaires as part of the assessment to identify what your key problem areas are and to form a treatment plan.  Once this is done the questionnaires will be used on a regular basis to ensure that treatment is moving in the right direction.  Think of it being similar to when someone is trying to loose weight and they hop on the scales each week to check their progress.

The most commonly used mood questionnaires are the PHQ-9 which measures symptoms of depression and the GAD-7 which measures symptoms of anxiety.  There are many more questionnaires which look at specific anxiety disorders and your therapist will tailor them to your needs.  It may be that you use the OCI for OCD, PCL-5 for PTSD or the SPIN for Social Anxiety.  Your therapist will be able to analyse your responses and tell you where your total score fits within a range such as mild, moderate or severe.  If your scores move from severe to mild then you know that something is working well.  If however the scores are not changing or they increase then that’s a sign to re-evaluate the treatment plan and consider what needs to change.

Questionnaires provide an opportunity for you to take some time to reflect and quantify what’s been happening for you.  They are also an opportunity for you to take an active role in your therapy.

Use these questionnaires as a conversation starter between you and your therapist.  Talk about what the questionnaires mean and how your answers compare over time.  If you’re a visual person then you might like to see the results plotted out on a graph.  Remember it’s not all about the numbers, it’s about what the numbers mean to you.  Consider what has made the numbers go up one week and down the next. Remember ‘knowledge is power’!

I hope you’ve enjoyed this second ‘CBT Essentials’ blog.  Please share the link via your Social Media platforms and join me next month to find out about setting goals for your treatment.