You see a client who has the diagnosis, Panic disorder. The client exhibits the following emotional responses: anxiety, fear, and terror, as well as the following behavioral responses: hypervigilance and avoidance. Describe the various CBT techniques you can employ to address both the client\’s emotional and behavioral responses.

 

You see a client who has the diagnosis, Panic disorder. The client exhibits the following emotional responses: anxiety, fear, and terror, as well as the following behavioral responses: hypervigilance and avoidance. Describe the various CBT techniques you can employ to address both the client\’s emotional and behavioral responses.

Posts are a minimum of 250 words, scholarly written, APA formatted (with some exceptions due to limitations in the D2L editor), and a minimum of 2 references (which may include the course textbook).

Panic Disorder 

Panic disorder is marked by recurring panic episodes that emerge as acute dread, worry, or terror, typically connected with sensations of oncoming doom and coupled with intense physical discomfort. The physical symptoms might be so acute that the person feels they are suffering from a heart attack. A successful therapy to panic disorder is cognitive behavioral therapy. The focus of CBT is to support the patient in developing techniques to understand the relationship connecting their thinking, emotions, and actions and to apply similar abilities to control how their thinking and sentiments interact and impact their behaviors (Neufeld et al., 2020). CBT provides panic attack coping strategies.

Cognitive Restructuring is a CBT strategy used to treat panic anxiety. Cognitive restructuring aims to acquire learning skills that help a patient learn how to distinguish between reasonable and irrational thinking, often known as cognitive distortions (Neufeld et al., 2020). Once patients can properly recognize their thoughts’ aberrations, they may concentrate on reconstructing their ideas in healthier and more constructive ways. Cognitive restructuring can assist a patient to understand that their invasive thoughts are not real and help come up with solutions to manage and prevent repeat panic episodes.

Mindfulness training in CBT entails paying attention to the current time. This is accomplished by breathing exercises, muscular relaxation, or grounding techniques to keep thoughts oriented in the present. Curtiss et al. (2021) discovered that patients with panic disorder exhibited substantial progress in their panic episodes and improvements in reports on overall panic disorder symptoms after an 8-week trial. Mindfulness-based CBT can significantly improve the quality of life for people who suffer from persistent panic episodes. CBT is an effective technique that aims to focus on intrinsic factors of the patient that aims to curb the panic episodes and symptoms.

References

Curtiss, J. E., Levine, D. S., Rosenbaum, J. F., & Baker, A. (2021). Cognitive-behavioral strategies to manage panic disorder. Psychiatric Annals, 51(5), 216–220. https://doi.org/10.3928/00485713-20210409-03

Neufeld, C. B., Palma, P. C., Caetano, K. A. S., Brust-Renck, P. G., Curtiss, J., & Hofmann, S. G. (2020). A randomized clinical trial of group and individual Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy approaches for Social Anxiety Disorder. International Journal of Clinical and Health Psychology: IJCHP, 20(1), 29–37. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijchp.2019.11.004