CBT can be powerful and effective and many people have benefitted from this active, evidence-based treatment. Like treatments for other psychological and medical conditions, we cannot expect everyone to benefit from CBT in the same way, and it is not a ‘one size fits all’ therapy. We will look at the factors involved in why CBT might not work as effectively as hoped, including factors related to understanding how OCD works for each individual person, what can happen in the process of therapy.

Victoria Bream trained as a Clinical Psychologist at the Institute of Psychiatry, Kings College London, and completed the Postgraduate Diploma in Cognitive Therapy at the Oxford Cognitive Therapy Centre OCTC. She has joined OHSPIC and the OCTC after 15 years working in the Centre for Anxiety Disorders and Trauma (CADAT) at the Maudsley Hospital, specialising in using CBT with people with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and related problems, and hoarding disorder. She has provided supervision and teaching to a wide range of trainees and professionals in the NHS, and in local authorities. She has contributed to numerous research publications and is a co-author of the self-help book ‘Break Free from OCD’, and the clinician guide ‘CBT for OCD’ (both books shown below).