Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT)

Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is a structured talking therapy. It works on the relationship between what you think, how you feel and what you then do — on the assumption that those three are connected, and that the one easiest to get hold of is not always the feeling.

Sessions have a shape. You and your psychologist agree what you are working on, you look together at the thoughts and habits that keep it going, and you try things between sessions rather than only talking about them in the room. PHC uses CBT for depression, anxiety and negative thought patterns.

What it is not: it is not advice, it is not being told to think positively, and it is not something you are handed before anyone has worked out what is going on. CBT is one of several modalities our psychologists are trained in. Whether it is the one indicated for you is a clinical decision made after an initial session, not a choice you have to make from a website.

Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy (REBT)

REBT sits in the same family and is also offered at PHC, for challenging irrational belief systems. Where it is the better fit, your psychologist will say so.

PHC is an assessment-first practice. Nobody begins CBT here because they asked for it by name — they begin it because an initial session found it was what the situation called for.

1. An initial session We ask what has been going on, for how long, and what it is costing you. Nothing is administered before this conversation. Where the picture needs more than a conversation, emotional assessment and symptom screening decides which further tests, if any, are clinically warranted.
2. A psychologist matched to what that found Psychologists at PHC are not assigned on availability. Assignment is based on speciality, your presenting needs and clinical fit. If the fit is not right, tell us and we will move you to someone else.
3. 50-minute sessions, in clinic or online A standard session is 50 minutes. If it runs beyond that and your psychologist has the time, you can extend by an hour at an extra fee — you are told what that is before it happens. Minor overruns of one to five minutes are not charged.
4. Reviewed as it goes What you are working on is revisited rather than assumed. Where trauma sits underneath, EMDR may be used alongside; where the difficulty is less about thoughts and more about managing emotion and relationships, DBT may be used instead.

At PHC, CBT is used with older children, teenagers and adults — people who can work with their own thinking out loud, and who have the room to try something between one session and the next.

For younger children the same work is usually done through play therapy and behavioural approaches rather than through talking, with the parents closely involved. That is not a lesser version of it; it is the form the work takes at that age.

It is also not the first thing that happens in every case. Where screening points somewhere else — a learning difficulty sitting behind exam anxiety, a trauma that has not been addressed, a picture that needs psychiatric input — you will be told that, and CBT is not started for the sake of starting something.

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.

Each of these has a page of its own explaining what PHC does about it. CBT is named on all six as a modality that may be indicated — which one applies to you is decided at the initial session.

• Anxiety
• Depression
• OCD
• Panic attacks
• Social anxiety
• ADHD

These are six of the presentations CBT is used for at PHC, not all of them. See every condition we work with →

PECHS. Plot 59A, Street 1 Rd, Shaheed-e-Millat Rohail Khand Society, Karachi 74800. Monday to Saturday, 10am–8pm PKT.

DHA. 2 Al Murtaza Commercial Lane 2, Zulfiqar & Al Murtaza Commercial Area, Phase 8, Zone A, DHA Karachi 75500.

Online. Video or audio on the platform you prefer, across Pakistan and in every time zone. How online sessions work →