Unified Protocol: A Transdiagnostic CBT for Emotional Disorders

Presenter Bio

Dr. Todd Farchione is a Research Associate Professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Boston University (BU). He earned his doctorate from the University of California, Los Angeles, and completed a clinical internship at the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center. Before joining the faculty at BU, he completed postdoctoral fellowships at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute and Hospital and the Center for Anxiety and Related Disorders (CARD).

Dr. Farchione currently directs a research group at CARD that focuses on understanding emotion and emotion regulation processes, identifying higher-order, functional, psychopathological mechanisms, and disseminating improved treatments for anxiety, mood, and commonly co-occurring disorders. He co-developed the UP for transdiagnostic treatment of emotional disorders and has made significant contributions to the evaluation and refinement of the protocol since its inception. Dr. Farchione has published extensively on the UP and the nature and treatment of emotional disorders more broadly.

Recent conceptualization of anxiety, depressive, and related “emotional” disorders emphasize their similarities rather than their differences. In response, there has been a movement in recent years away from traditional disorder-specific manuals for the treatment of these disorders and toward treatment approaches that focus on addressing psychological processes that appear to cut across disorders. These “transdiagnostic” evidence-based treatments may prove more cost-efficient and potentially increase the availability of evidence-based treatments to meet a significant public health need.

The Unified Protocol for Transdiagnostic Treatment of Emotional Disorders (UP), developed by Drs. Barlow and Farchione, and others at Boston University, is the most recognizable and widely used transdiagnostic treatment protocol with empirical support for its use. The UP is an emotion-focused, cognitive behavioral treatment comprising five core modules or components. These modules were designed to directly target temperamental characteristics, particularly neuroticism, and resulting emotion dysregulation, underlying all anxiety, depressive, and related disorders, rather than focus on surface-level DSM diagnostic symptoms.

This introductory workshop, presented by one of the co-developers of the UP, will provide clinicians with the knowledge and skills to apply this innovative treatment to commonly occurring (and co-occurring) mental health disorders such as anxiety and depression. The workshop will begin with a brief conceptual and descriptive overview of the UP and the mechanisms underlying temperamental change. This will be followed by a description and demonstration of how to apply core UP treatment modules, along with the similarities and differences between UP and traditional CBT. Videotaped illustrations of core treatment interventions (e.g., mindful emotion awareness and emotion exposures) will be presented, and attendees will be invited to participate in exercises as part of these demonstrations.

Course Objectives

At the conclusion of this course, participants will be able to:

Identify core temperamental characteristics and deficits in emotion regulation underlying all anxiety, depressive, and related disorders.
Describe how core underlying mechanisms related to psychopathology are assessed and targeted within the UP’s transdiagnostic framework.
Identify the UP’s five core emotion-focused treatment strategies (increasing mindful emotion awareness, fostering cognitive flexibility, identifying and reducing patterns of emotion avoidance, increasing awareness and tolerance of emotion-related physical sensations, and interoceptive and situational emotion-focused exposures).
Describe how the core UP modules can be applied to patients presenting with comorbid emotional disorders.
Create effective and cohesive emotion exposures for patients with anxiety, depression, and complex comorbidities.

Instructional Level

Advanced

Licensed mental health professionals employed through Kaiser Permanente and psychological assistants performing under supervision of a licensed psychologist.

This CE program is free to Kaiser Permanente employees.
Instructional Methodology
Lecture
Audio/Visual
On-line Presentation

Continuing Education Information

Kaiser Permanente Northern California Mental Health Training Program is approved by the California Psychological Association to provide continuing professional education for psychologists. The Kaiser Permanente Northern California Mental Health Training Program maintains responsibility for this program and its content.

Refund and Attendance Policy

All programs offered on KP Learn for CE credit through the KP Northern California Mental Health Training website are free of charge to Kaiser Permanente Staff and trainees. Once a course is selected in the KP NCAL MH Training Website, the registration process begins, and it will appear in the individuals KP Learn profile for completion within 90 days.

IMPORTANT NOTICE: Those who attend the program in full and complete the appropriate evaluation form will receive CE credits. Please note that credit will only be granted to those who attend the entire program. An attestation of attendance will be given once the individual has completed viewing the program, which will then initiate the final steps of completing the evaluation forms to receive a certificate of completion.