The DBT Centre of Vancouver provides a range of evidence-based psychological services for adults. We offer both individual and group psychotherapy and will individually tailor your treatment to best meet your needs. Our comprehensive DBT program is provided in strict adherence with the DBT model developed by Dr. Marsha Linehan.
Intake Assessment
Our services start with an intake assessment where you’ll begin by filling out some important forms and questionnaires. You’ll then meet with a clinician for approximately 1.5 – 2 hours to discuss what is bringing you in for treatment and to gather a history of the problems you’ve faced. At the end of the assessment, we’ll discuss our diagnostic impressions and answer any related questions to help in selecting the best treatment for you. We will also write up a report summarizing this information and our findings.
The intake is not a comprehensive psychodiagnostic assessment and is limited in scope. The intake is not for legal purposes or to determine eligibility for other programs, services, and status; additionally, ADHD and/or autism spectrum disorder can not be assessed.
Intakes are available in-person or via Zoom.
Individual Therapy
We offer a range of individual therapy services including dialectical behaviour therapy, cognitive-behavioural therapy, and mindfulness and acceptance based treatments. Our individual therapy is designed to address your most pressing needs whether it be problems related to mood, anxiety, suicide or self-harm, drug and alcohol use, eating disordered behaviour, or a variety of other problems. These one-on-one sessions typically occur for 50 minutes per week with the length of the treatment dependent on your individual needs.
Some clinicians are providing sessions in-person and some clinicians are providing sessions via Zoom only.
Group Skills Training
We also offer ongoing DBT Skills Training Groups. These groups, which are structured much like a class, meet weekly for 2 hours over the course of 26 weeks and are designed to provide clients with concrete strategies for building better lives. Specifically, we teach participants the following sets of skills.
- Mindfulness Skills– to help clients be more aware of their thoughts and emotions, less judgmental of themselves and others, and more alert to the present moment.
- Distress Tolerance Skills – to provide people with a variety of strategies for more effectively managing stressful situations and being more accepting of things they cannot change.
- Emotion Regulation Skills – to assist people in better managing their emotions by providing strategies for increasing emotional awareness, decreasing emotional vulnerabilities, and changing unwanted emotions.
- Interpersonal Effectiveness Skills – to teach clients skills for more effectively asking for what one wants, building more meaningful relationships, and feeling good about oneself when doing so.
All groups are running via Zoom only.
We are currently running groups on the following days.
- Mondays from 5:30 – 7:30pm
- Tuesdays from 5:30 – 7:30pm
- Tuesdays from 6pm – 8pm
- Thursdays from 5:30pm – 7:30pm
We run a separate DBT skills group for those that identify as lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, trans, queer, two-spirit, or gender-diverse. Please let us know if you would like more details. The content and structure of the group is the same as the standard 26-week DBT skills group.
Clients that see a mental health clinician on a regular basis may be eligible to join as a “group only” client. The DBT group skills program is not therapy (and does not replace individual therapy) as such all clients must be under the care of a psychologist, counsellor, or social worker) and see them at least once a month. All clients need to start with the intake assessment to ensure that the DBT group skills program would be appropriate. Group only clients are welcome to “transfer” their individual therapy services once a DBT clinician becomes available. Please let us know if this option might be of interest.
Telephone Consultation
Our clinicians are also available to clients in-between sessions for telephone calls. These calls are designed to provide assistance and help build adaptive coping behaviours in difficult situations. They can be used to strengthen existing skills and help clients better generalize learned skills to the world around them.
Fees
Click here for a list of our fees.
If you are interested in DBT services for yourself or a loved one, please fill in the form below or email info@dbtvancouver.com for more information.