Attachment-Based ISTDP focuses on repairing the disrupted attachment bonds which lead to many of the difficulties and symptoms patients experience. Dr Neborsky is at the forefront of development of these techniques and Alex Knowles and Sharon Lewis have studied and worked alongside him for the past decade in the UK.

The symposium will explore the links between symptom development after traumatic events and early attachment experiences.  Each of the presenters will show video extracts of therapy sessions to demonstrate innovative techniques to treat symptoms such as anxiety, hyperarousal and intrusive memories.

Interventions that will be highlighted include:

• Understanding of different anxiety pathways so as to ensure emotional experiencing is at a tolerable level
• Specific strategies for working with different anxiety symptoms
• Working with flashbacks and intrusive memories
• Separation of fear and other emotional pathways so emotional processing of trauma can take place.

Robert J. Neborsky, M.D., is a psychiatrist in private practice in Del Mar, California, and a Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at UCSD School of Medicine and UCLA School of Medicine (Hon). Dr Neborsky initially trained in ISTDP with Dr Habib Davanloo in the 1980s, and in 2003 he was one of the founders of the Southern California Society for IS-TDP. He was also a founding member on the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy.

Dr. Neborsky’s professional activities include training students in the techniques of his unique Attachment-Based Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy (AB-ISTDP) and presenting at local, national and international symposia. He co-authored Short-Term Therapy for Long Term Change (Norton, 2001) and is a contributing author of Healing Trauma (Norton, 2003). In 2010, he edited and published The Collected Writings of Robert J Neborsky, MD along with The Collected Writings of Josette ten Have de Labije, (Itasca). In 2011, he co-authored Mastering Intensive Short-term Dynamic Psychotherapy: A Roadmap to the Unconscious.

Alexandra Knowles is a UKCP registered Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist through the Universities Psychotherapy & Counselling Association (UPCA) and an Honorary Member of the Forum for Independent Psychotherapists (FiP) which she founded. She originally trained over 30 years ago as a Psychoanalytic Psychotherapist working in Therapeutic Communities was well as in private practice, teaching and supervising. Following the first ISTDP Oxford Conference in 2006, put on by David Malan she joined the initial group of UK therapists to be trained in ISTDP. Subsequently she became accredited by the International Experiential Dynamic Therapy Association (IEDTA) as an ISTDP teacher and supervisor. She has presented extensively at conferences and is involved in the training and supervision of therapists. Currently she devotes her time to her ISTDP practice working with individuals and couples and runs core training groups in London and Oxford.

Dr Sharon Lewis is a chartered clinical psychologist, registered with the British Psychological Society and the Health and Care Professions Council. She currently works in private practice as well as in a Rheumatology service in the NHS. She is an IEDTA accredited trainer and supervisor in ISTDP and runs core training programmes in the UK. She has previously worked as clinical supervisor of the Trauma Clinic of the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation in South Africa and has published in the areas of childhood trauma and post traumatic stress disorder, and conducted research into treatment-resistant depression.