Dr
Loumidis has successfully treated over a thousand people. He
offers a bespoke approach, skilfully tailoring scientifically based and
empirically tested psychological therapies, such as cognitive
behavioural therapy, to personal sensitivities and complex
individual circumstances, often combining different therapies and approaches.
Choice of psychological therapies
The choice of psychological treatment (or therapy) depends on your
individual needs and preferences and Dr Loumidis will discuss this
matter with you. Individually tailored therapies combining elements
from various therapies are also available for certain types of
problems. Dr Loumidis offers a wide range of scientifically based and
clinically tested psychological treatments (or therapies).
Idiosyncratic case and problem formulation
Every person is treated as an individual and your idiosyncratic problem
formulation will form the basis of your individual treatment plan. The
choice and content of therapy sessions is informed by an in-depth
assessment of your needs and relevant clinical research and
practice. These are flexibly tailored to your goals, which you
can re-negotiate at any point.
Evaluating progress
Dr Loumidis will periodically evaluate how well you
are progressing, often using a range of outcome measures and
psychometric tests and will discuss your progress with you. With
your consent he will write progress reports to your referrer and/or
your GP and copy any correspondence to you, if you so wish.
Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT)
Behavioural and
Cognitive Psychotherapies are psychological approaches which are based
on scientific principles and which research has shown to be effective
for a wide range of problems. CBT helps people identify and understand
problems in terms of the relationship between thoughts, feelings and
behaviour. The approach usually focuses on current as well as past
difficulties and relies on you and Dr Loumidis developing a shared
view of your
problems. This then leads to the identification of personalised,
time-limited therapy goals and strategies, which are continually
monitored and evaluated. More information is available from the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive
Psychotherapies (BABCP).
Counselling
Counselling is a systematic process which gives individuals an
opportunity to explore, discover and clarify ways of living more
resourcefully, with a greater sense of wellbeing. Counselling may be
concerned with addressing and resolving specific problems, making
decisions, coping with crises, working through conflict, or improving
relationships with others.
Bereavement counselling
When someone close to us dies or is in the process of dying, people may
have trouble coping with the intense feelings of grief or may feel a
strong sense of isolation or confusion. Some people find it helpful to
talk about these feelings with someone from outside their family or
friends. Bereavement counselling focuses on helping people and
relatives understand their grief and to adjust to life after loss. It
can also help people to understand other people around them who may be
expressing their grief in different ways.
Behavioural therapy
Behavioural therapy is based on the principle that many of our actions
are the result of things that we have learned in the past or more
recently. The focus of behavioural interventions is on definable
behaviours that can be readily monitored and addressed in therapeutic
interventions. It is a very directive therapy which sets objectives (in
collaboration with you) for you to attain. Dr Loumidis will offer you
homework assignments to help you understand your difficulties and
achieve your goals. It is particularly good for treating phobias,
obsessional and compulsive behaviour and can also be helpful in dealing
with some sexual problems. Anxiety management and exposure therapy are
particular types of behavioural therapy.
Anxiety management
This approach involves a varying mixture of behavioural strategies. The
strategies commonly include education about the nature of anxiety (e.g.,
fight-or-flight response), recognising hyperventilation, the
slow-breathing technique, relaxation training and graded exposure.
Stress management, assertiveness training and structured
problem-solving may also be included, depending on your needs.
Graded exposure
People who avoid particular places or people because of anxiety (i.e.,
those suffering from phobias, obsessive-compulsive disorder or panic)
are encouraged gradually to face the things they fear, starting with
easy situations and building up slowly to harder things. Breathing and
relaxation techniques may be used to help you remain in the feared
situation until the anxiety diminishes and you can learn that you can
cope with the situation. Dr Loumidis will prepare you and provide you
with support but will not accompany you in your
assignments.
Compliance therapy
This is a form of counselling, usually used for people with severe
mental illness who are reluctant to take medication. It encourages you
to take an active role in monitoring your illness and negotiating
treatment decisions. Your views about medication are elicited,
any ambivalence is explored, and options are considered in an atmosphere of support
and empathy, avoiding blaming. This interactive approach has proved
more successful than a simple didactic approach.
Family interventions (for
people with schizophrenia)
This is a form of psychosocial intervention, providing
information to you and your family about the illness, and helping them
to improve their ability and confidence in tackling problems
effectively. The approach is broadly behavioural, and the family is
encouraged to set realistic goals, to avoid making unrealistic demands on you and to make the environment
of the person who is ill less stressful.
Interpersonal therapy
Interpersonal psychotherapy uses the connection between the onset of
symptoms and current interpersonal problems as a treatment focus. It
deals with current, rather than past, relationships, and maintains a
clear focus on your social context and dysfunction, rather than your
personality.
Problem solving therapy
Structured problem solving can help you sort out and deal with stresses
that contribute to worry and depression. It involves encouraging you to
identify specific problems, to order them in terms of importance and
then to focus on one problem at a time, writing down potential
solutions and identifying specific steps that they might take to
implement the solutions. A main aim is to assist you to incorporate the
principles of efficient problem solving and goal achievement into your
everyday lives. The aim is not for Dr Loumidis to solve your problems
for you, but to give you skills so that you can effectively use to overcome
problems and achieve goals for yourself. Self-management is a key goal,
with Dr Loumidis adopting the role of teacher or guide.
Motivational interviewing
This is a directive, client-centred counselling style for eliciting
behaviour change by helping clients to explore and resolve ambivalence.
Compared with non-directive counselling, it is more focused and
goal-directed. The examination and resolution of ambivalence is the
central purpose, and Dr Loumidis will be intentionally directive in
pursuing this goal. It can be helpful for people with alcohol problems,
drug addictions, gambling problems, and also a wider range of problems
where people are resistant or ambivalent about changing.
Supportive psychotherapy
Some people have ongoing difficulties in their lives which cannot be
resolved, who become disorganised when confronted with stressful
situations, or may have a personality style which makes it very
difficult for them to benefit from other treatments. Dr Loumidis will
offer a safe and trustworthy forum in which you discuss the troubling
aspects of your life and act as a strong guide/authority figure,
outlining things that you should do and not do. This type of
therapy is not exploratory and doesn't delve into the past histories.
Schema therapy
Schema therapy is an innovative psychotherapy for personality
disorders, chronic depression, and other difficult individual and
couples' problems. Schema therapy integrates elements of cognitive
therapy, behaviour therapy, object relations, and gestalt therapy into
one unified, systematic approach to treatment.
Rational emotive behaviour therapy (REBT)
REBT (formerly known as RET) is a form of Cognitive Behavioural
Therapy. REBT is an action-oriented psychotherapy which teaches
individuals how to identify their own self-defeating thoughts, beliefs
and actions and replace them with more effective, life-enhancing ones.
Psychosexual counselling
This is a specialist form of counselling which can offer help for a range
of problems such as general sexual problems (such as difficulty
reaching orgasm, pain during intercourse, problems controlling
ejaculation or in reaching orgasm), sexual health concerns, sexual
phobias and paraphilias, gender dysphoria and sexual orientation
difficulties.
Systemic therapy
Systemic and family therapy aims to identify and explore patterns of
belief and behaviour in roles and relationships. The therapist actively
intervenes to enable people to decide where change would be desirable
and to facilitate the process of establishing new, more fulfilling and
useful patterns. Therapy is often relatively short term.
Individually tailored bespoke therapies
Often people's difficulties need to be understood and formulated using
more than one theoretical framework and Dr Loumidis may choose a mix of
techniques from more than one therapy approach. The resulting therapy
is pragmatic and tailored to the individual.
Clinics
Birmingham - London - Leicester - Manchester - Shrewsbury - Wolverhampton - Worcester - Other venues
