Understanding ‘emerging’ Borderline Personality Disorder: early interventions, and clinicians’ perspectives.

Papadopoullos, Rose (2019) Understanding ‘emerging’ Borderline Personality Disorder: early interventions, and clinicians’ perspectives. Doctoral thesis, University of East Anglia.

Preview

PDF Download (2MB) | Preview

Abstract

Aims: This work aims to increase our understanding of the use of the diagnosis ‘emerging’ Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) diagnosis in young people under the age of 18. It contains a review of the evidence around early psychological intervention for BPD followed by an empirical exploration of clinicians’ perspectives on how this diagnosis is used clinically.

Design: This project is structured as a portfolio briefly comprising of; an overall introduction to the topic, a systematic review and meta-analysis of the psychosocial outcomes of early intervention for BPD, a qualitative empirical paper exploring the experiences of clinicians working in child and adolescent mental health services in England, an extended methodology, and an overall discussion and critical evaluation.

Findings: Multiple models of intervention exist for BPD in adolescence. The meta-analysis provides some tentative evidence that early interventions for BPD might have a positive impact, particularly on quality of life outcomes. However, there was little overall benefit of intervention over and above standard clinical care.

In the empirical paper, clinicians expressed a number of dilemmas surrounding the use of BPD diagnosis, including how diagnosis impacts on the young person and the way services understand them. This topic is seen as controversial, with polarised perspectives leading to ‘debate’ among team members.

Value of this work: There is clearly a lack of evidence supporting early intervention for BPD symptomatology, and a need for more robust research exploring the mechanisms, acceptability, and potential outcomes. This work also highlights conflicts and dynamics that can arise in services and may be helpful for thinking about if and how to use BPD diagnosis in adolescents in the future. It is hoped that this could be useful to front-line clinicians involved in the assessment, diagnosis and treatment of children and/or adolescents with mental health difficulties, and to commissioners and those involved in service development.

Item Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences > Norwich Medical School
Depositing User:	Users 11011 not found.
Date Deposited:	18 Oct 2019 12:39
Last Modified:	18 Oct 2019 12:39
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/72701
DOI:

Downloads

Actions (login required)

View Item