Brief Emotion Focused Family Therapy: An Intervention for Parents of Children and Adolescents with Mental Health Issues.

This study evaluated the 2-day intensive modality of Emotion Focused Family Therapy (EFFT). The intervention attempts to prepare parents to take a primary role in their child's recovery from a range of mental health issues. One hundred and twenty-four parents completed the intervention and provided data a week prior to intervention, post-intervention and at 4-month follow-up. Results include significantly reduced parent blocks and increased parental self-efficacy in relation to involvement in their child's recovery, as well as significant improvement in child symptomatology. The findings confirm positive results from an earlier pilot study involving eating disorders and demonstrate the potential for EFFT as an intervention for a range of clinical problems in children and youth.

The influence of carer fear and self-blame when supporting a loved one with an eating disorder.

Carers often feel disempowered and engage in behaviours that inadvertently enable their loved one's ED symptoms and yet little is known regarding these processes. This study examined the relationships among fear, self-blame, self-efficacy, and accommodating and enabling behaviours in 137 carers of adolescents and adults with ED. The results revealed that fear and self-blame predicted low carer self-efficacy in supporting their loved one's recovery as well as the extent to which carers reported engaging in recovery-interfering behaviours. The relevance of these findings are discussed in the context of family-oriented ED therapies and highlight the importance for clinicians to attend to and help to process strong emotions in carers, in order to improve their supportive efforts and, ultimately, ED outcomes.

Emotion-Focused Family Therapy for Eating Disorders Across the Lifespan: A Pilot Study of a 2-Day Transdiagnostic Intervention for Parents.

UNLABELLED: Emotion-focused family therapy is a transdiagnostic approach that affords parents and caregivers a significant role in their loved one's recovery from an eating disorder. A 2-day intervention was developed on the basis of emotion-focused family therapy principles and delivered to 33 parents of adolescent and adult children. Data were collected pre- and post-intervention. Through education and skills practice, parents were taught strategies with respect to meal support and symptom interruption as well as emotion coaching. Parents were also supported to identify and work through their own emotional blocks that could interfere with their supportive efforts. Analyses revealed a significant increase in parental self-efficacy, a positive shift in parents' attitudes regarding their role as emotion coach and a reduction in the fears associated with their involvement in treatment, including a decrease in self-blame. Overall, this broad-based, low-cost intervention shows promise, and future research is warranted. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. KEY PRACTITIONER MESSAGE: A low-cost, intensive emotion-focused family therapy intervention shows promise for parents of individuals with an eating disorder, regardless of their loved one's age, symptom profile or involvement in treatment. Working with parents' emotions and emotional reactions to their child's struggles has the potential to improve supportive efforts. An emotion-focused family therapy intervention for parents yields high satisfaction rates, improves parental self-efficacy and reduces fears regarding their involvement, including self-blame.

Emotion-focused group therapy for women with symptoms of bulimia nervosa.

This study provides outcome pilot data for an outpatient emotion-focused therapy group for 12 women with DSM-IV diagnoses of binge-eating disorder, bulimia nervosa, or eating disorder not otherwise specified. The emotion-focused therapy group involved 16 weekly sessions that targeted problematic emotions connected to eating disorder symptoms. Semi-structured clinical interviews were conducted pre- and post-treatment and self-report questionnaires were administered. From pre- to post-treatment, changes in binge eating and scores on self-report measures were statistically significant. Participants reported a decrease in the frequency of binge episodes, improvements in mood, and improvements in emotion regulation and self-efficacy.

Emotion-focused family therapy for eating disorders in children and adolescents.

UNLABELLED: Family-based therapy (FBT) is regarded as best practice for the treatment of eating disorders in children and adolescents. In FBT, parents play a vital role in bringing their child or adolescent to health; however, a significant minority of families do not respond to this treatment. This paper introduces a new model whereby FBT is enhanced by integrating emotion-focused therapy (EFT) principles and techniques with the aims of helping parents to support their child's refeeding and interruption of symptoms. Parents are also supported to become their child's 'emotion coach'; and to process any emotional 'blocks' that may interfere with their ability to take charge of recovery. A parent testimonial is presented to illustrate the integration of the theory and techniques of EFT in the FBT model. EFFT (Emotion-Focused Family Therapy) is a promising model of therapy for those families who require a more intense treatment to bring about recovery of an eating disorder. KEY PRACTITIONER MESSAGE: More intense therapeutic models exist for treatment-resistant eating disorders in children and adolescents. Emotion is a powerful healing tool in families struggling with an eating disorder. Working with parent's emotions and emotional reactions to their child's struggles has the potential to improve child outcomes.

Emotion-focused therapy in a case of anorexia nervosa.

An emotion-focused approach to the treatment of eating disorders and to case formulation is described in an individual with anorexia nervosa (AN). The basic theory of emotion-focused therapy (EFT), the steps of case formulation and an outline of the tasks and course of treatment of an individual recently hospitalized on an inpatient unit for eating disorders highlight key aspects of the approach. The transformation in this individual, in terms of gaining access to her internal experience, understanding and tolerating her emotions, and working through her core themes of insecure attachment and worthlessness, is described. Weight and scores on self-report measures at the outset of treatment and at 18 months are provided.