Benchmark Psychology’s priority is to get you the right treatment at the right time, individually tailored to you.

 

We also know choice is important. That’s why we will work at the outset to ensure you and your psychologist have a good rapport and can build a strong relationship built on trust and teamwork.

 

Time is also important to us. Waiting times can exacerbate distress and cause relationships to break down, jobs to be lost, people to be isolated, and symptoms to get to the point where they are almost unbearable. We strive to ensure the time between referral and consultation timeframe is minimal.

Benchmark Psychology use therapies widely recognised as being effective first-line treatments for a wide range of problems.  Our approach is to present and explain all of the options available to you. We will monitor, track, analyse and report on your progress every step of the way.   If at any time we identify that a treatment is not progressing your goal, we will present you with options for other treatment approaches that you may respond better to.  Of course, therapy is about team work, so we are equally interested in hearing feedback.  If at any point you feel that your individual therapy is headed down the wrong track our therapists will seek to find another pathway to treat you.  After all, treatment should be all about you, not about our ego.

 

 

Our treatment options include:

 

  • CBT (Cogitative Behaviour Therapy)
    The most widely researched and well-established set of principles for changing problematic thoughts and behaviours.  CBT incorporates a range of specific cognitive strategies to identify and alter unhelpful thought patterns, as well as strong research techniques for behavioural modification and change.

  • ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy)

    A relatively new, but increasingly well-recognised set of principles used to help with a range of problems.  ACT assumes that sometimes it is not about changing thoughts and behaviours, but about learning how to accept parts of ourselves, our worlds and other people as they are – rather than as we would like them to be.

  • DBT (Dialectic Behavioural Therapy)
    A set of techniques developed to help people with borderline personality disorder, but which have proven useful in treating a range of problems than centre around emotion management.

  • Schema Focus Therapy
    Schemas are ingrained ways of viewing the world that cause people to behave in ways that are not always helpful to them.  Invariably, these schemas were formed during childhood and adolescence where they were often quite helpful, but are now creating difficulties and stopping people from reaching their full potential.

  • Interpersonal psychotherapy

    When all else is stripped away, therapy is just a relationship between two people.  The way you behave in that relationship can give valuable clues as to how you behave in other interpersonal relationships.  Therapy involves exploring the interaction between you and your therapist, and looking for patterns.  Therapy is also a safe place to trial out new ways of interacting, knowing that your therapist will not judge you or think less of you for trying something new.  This is usually a longer-term therapy, but elements of this technique can often be incorporated into any of the approaches above.

  • Motivational Interviewing

    Motivational Interviewing assumes that change is tough and there are often parts of us that want to change, with equally (and sometimes stronger parts) that wants to stay the same.  Motivational Interviewing is a process for helping people be sure that the changes they are making are for the better, and to implement the changes they want to make.

  • Person Centred Therapy

    Sometimes the best type of therapy is simply having someone listen to you, and ask you the tough questions that your friends don’t ask.  By contemplating those tough questions and formulating the answers, a better understanding of yourself or your problems can often be reached.