Royal Ottawa Health Care Group and ROHCG Psychology Residency Program 2011-12 Present: Mindfulness-Based Trauma Therapy - Compassion, Exposure, and Metacognitive Awareness

Presented by: John Briere, Ph.D.

Location: Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre, Associates in Psychiatry Auditorium 1145 Carling Avenue, Ottawa, Ontario

When: June 29, 2012

Program at a Glance

Modern approaches to trauma tend to focus on the psychopathology of adverse experience. However, it is not necessarily trauma exposure that is the ultimate problem, nor is the solution to trauma-related difficulties necessarily a clinical procedure. Trauma will be described as a normal part of human experience, with chronic posttraumatic suffering more likely when trauma-related memories, thoughts, and feelings are experienced as unacceptable and overwhelming, and then excluded from awareness through thought suppression, behavioral avoidance, distraction, or numbing. Yet, research indicates that avoiding pain actually increases symptoms and distress, and directly experiencing and allowing pain ultimately reduces its power. This seeming paradox, long appreciated in Buddhist psychology, requires a reworking of traditional therapeutic models so that awareness can increase in the context of carefully titrated engagement with -- and less encumbered consideration of – painful history. John Briere will outline the clinical implications of this perspective, emphasizing the role of compassion, mindfulness, and metacognitive awareness.

Attendees will be able to:

• Describe a model of trauma and posttraumatic outcomes that integrates Western and Buddhist psychologies and does not pathologize the client
• Apply broad-band therapeutic exposure methodologies that are less likely to overwhelm the trauma client and more likely to
• facilitate complex trauma processing
• Help the client develop metacognitive awareness, trigger identification, and other approaches to affect regulation/tolerance
• Outline the psychological and neurobiological effects of compassion on the therapist and client
• Use mindfulness techniques to decrease countertransference and increase equanimity and attunement

Target Audience

Psychologists, Social Workers, Nurses, Psychiatrists, and other mental health professionals, including Graduate Students and Post-doctoral Fellows.

About Dr. John Briere

John Briere, Ph.D. is Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Psychology at the Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, and Director of the Psychological Trauma Program at LAC-USC Medical Center. A past president of the International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies (ISTSS), he is recipient of the American Psychological Association’s Award for Outstanding Contributions to the Science of Trauma Psychology. He has been designated as "Highly Cited Researcher – Behavioral Science" by the Institute for Scientific Information, and is author or co-author of over 100 articles and chapters, 11 books, two treatment manuals, and nine psychological tests in the areas of trauma, child abuse, interpersonal violence, and mindfulness. His newest book, co- written with Cheryl Lanktree, Ph.D., is Treating complex trauma in adolescents and young adults. His website can be found at www.JohnBriere.com.

Registration Fees

Regular: $120.

Students: $ 60.

To register: click here

For more information, contact Lucie Moore at lucie.moore@theroyal.ca or phone at 613-722-6521, ext. 6570 or visit  http://www.theroyal.ca/en/events/professional-development/