Psychotherapy at PHC
The therapies our psychologists are trained in, and how one of them comes to be the one you are offered. In clinic in PECHS and DHA, or online wherever you are.
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There are thirteen therapy pages on this site and you are not expected to pick one. That is worth saying first, because a list this long reads like a menu and it is not one. PHC is an assessment-first practice: you tell us what has been going on, an initial session works out what is in front of us, and the therapy follows from that. Some of what follows are modalities — a named, structured way of working, like CBT or EMDR. Some are service areas — who is in the room and what the work is about, like marriage counselling or family psychotherapy. Most courses of therapy here are a modality applied inside a service area. Every page below tells you what its sessions involve, and every one says the same thing about how it gets chosen.
The ways of working
Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT). Structured work on the relationship between thoughts, feelings and behaviour. Used at PHC for depression, anxiety and negative thought patterns. REBT sits in the same family and is offered here too.
Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT). Skills-based work for emotional regulation and interpersonal effectiveness, where feelings arrive faster and harder than they can be managed.
EMDR therapy. An eight-phase protocol used at PHC for trauma processing, with a Level 1 trained EMDR therapist on the team.
Trauma therapy. For past or ongoing trauma, at whatever pace the person sets. Includes what trauma-informed practice means in a session.
Clinical hypnotherapy. A focused, relaxed state used alongside a wider treatment plan — and a plain account of what it is not. NLP techniques are described here too.
Play therapy for children under 7. Child-Centered Play Therapy and targeted directive techniques, for children too young to do this work by talking.
Who is in the room
Individual psychotherapy. One-to-one, 50 minutes, in clinic or online. How a psychologist is matched to you.
Marriage and couples counselling. Both partners in the room, with a structure — including what happens when only one of you wants to come.
Family psychotherapy. When the pattern lives between people rather than inside one of them, and the family is the unit of work.
Group psychotherapy. A small, closed group with a clinician in it. How groups are formed and what confidentiality means in one.
Work with a defined focus
Stress and anger management. Structured sessions for individuals and for employees, with progress reviewed rather than assumed.
Career counselling. Built on aptitude and vocational testing first, then structured guidance. Assessment, not opinion.
Sexual psychotherapy. Confidential talking therapy for individuals and couples, by postgraduate-qualified clinical psychologists.
How we choose which therapy
PHC's own phrase for this is the eclectic approach: a combination of modalities, where that is what best serves the client's needs. In practice it means your psychologist is not committed to one method before meeting you, and is not obliged to stay with one afterwards.
An initial session comes first, always. Where the picture needs more than a conversation, emotional assessment and symptom screening decides which further tests, if any, are clinically warranted. Then a psychologist is matched to what that found — on speciality, presenting needs and clinical fit, not on who happens to be free.
Some of what our clinicians are trained in has no page of its own and is not being hidden from you: humanistic and client-centred therapy, psychodynamic- and attachment-informed work, Gestalt therapy, art and creative approaches, mindfulness, behavioural therapy, Applied Behaviour Analysis, sensory integration, and eidetic therapy — an approach that works through the vivid mental images a person already carries, and which is less widely used in Pakistan than CBT or DBT. You can see which clinician is trained in what.
You are welcome to tell us you are interested in a particular therapy; it is useful to know. What you will not be handed is a modality nobody has established is the right one for you.
Speaking to someone starts here
PHC is appointment-only. Message or call and a real person answers — Monday to Saturday, 10am to 8pm PKT.
Not sure whether this is us? Contact us anyway. We will tell you directly whether we can help, and refer you elsewhere if we cannot.
Six details, and we can match you
- Name of the person who will attend
- Their age
- What is going on, in your own words
- Whether you would prefer a male or female psychologist
- Online, or in clinic in Karachi
- Whether the person attending is a minor or elderly
If someone else is paying, we will also ask for guardian or payer details. A slot is held once the booking payment is received — half the fee, at least 24 hours ahead.