23rd Annual OCD Conference

This presentation will focus on responding to treatment resistance in OCD by combining current research with practical clinical strategies targeting treatment motivation. The first two sections will summarize research findings among clinical samples of individuals with OCD. Dr. Monaghan and Ms. Chiupka will present on the impact of readiness to engage in behavior change and externalizing blame on treatment outcomes and overall quality of life. The second two sections will focus on translating empirical findings into applicable treatment strategies. Dr. Van Kirk and Dr. Elias will discuss how they have applied current research findings to OCD treatment, with a focus on conceptualizing motivation as a skill that can be practiced and implemented throughout recovery.

Although ERP remains the gold-standard treatment for OCD, it is notably aversive. Consequently, drop-out/non-compliance rates remain high, suggesting a need for augmentative treatment strategies. Given that ERP requires an ability to tolerate negative emotions, one factor that may mitigate treatment engagement and serve as a viable therapeutic target is emotional intolerance, or the inability/unwillingness to tolerate emotional distress. This symposium will investigate how aspects of emotional intolerance (i.e., distress tolerance, worry, emotion dysregulation, disgust sensitivity) contribute to OCD symptom severity, and longitudinally influence processes of change throughout treatment. Panelists will discuss implications for the theoretical model of OCD and the development of novel treatment strategies. The symposium will include expert presentations, discussant remarks, and audience Q&A.

An important predictor of successful treatment outcome in exposure-based therapy is a client's ability to tolerate distress. Clients who are unable to tolerate distress will either not agree to engage in exposures, use escape or avoidance strategies during the exposures, and/or not practice exposures for homework. In this workshop presenters will review distress tolerance and exposure therapy research, demonstrate the negative impact poor distress tolerance has in exposure therapy utilizing case examples, and provide strategies for improving a client's distress tolerance and readiness for initiating or resuming exposure therapy.