Designing Behavioral-Emotional-Spiritual Therapy for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder: A Qualitative Study

 Although several treatments have been designed for obsessive-compulsive disorder, they are not effective enough in all patients. Hence, obsession therapists are looking for multidimensional treatments. The aim of the current research is to design a behavioral spiritual-emotional protocol for the treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder.

 Given the purpose of the research, the effective treatment packages developed in previous researches should be analyzed in behavioral, emotional and spiritual axes, and effective goals and techniques should be selected and integrated in the emotional-spiritual behavioral treatment package according to the Islamic context. The statistical population of this research included articles and theses related to behavioral, emotional and spiritual treatments of obsessive compulsive disorder in Farsi and English. These researches were collected and analyzed into components, techniques and mechanisms. Then, the effective components, techniques and mechanisms with good theoretical support and research evidence were integrated into the behavioral- emotional-spiritual protocol. The final package was approved and confirmed by experts in the field. In the present study, all ethical considerations were observed and the authors reported no conflict of interests.

 The behavioral-emotional-spiritual protocol for the treatment of obsessive compulsive disorder includes 15 sessions: establishing a therapeutic relationship and explaining the treatment, secondary positive spiritual evaluation of negative thoughts, acceptance of doubts, self-soothing, reducing the fusion of thought and action, exposure and response prevention therapy, acceptance of doubts and behavior management, spiritual mindfulness, removing obstacles, increasing the quality of life and modifying the lifestyle.

 Behavioral-emotional-spiritual Protocol for Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Treatment has collected and integrated the effective components and techniques of behavioral, emotional and spiritual treatments. In this therapeutic package, emphasis was placed on the value of religion and religiosity, as well as the differences between a religious individual and an individual with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Some new techniques were developed, such as distinguishing between voluntary negative thoughts and involuntary negative thoughts, with the latter being considered as obsessive thoughts and not sinful. Additionally, secondary positive evaluation techniques were formulated, whereby enduring intrusive negative thoughts was conceptualized as a step towards seeking closeness to God.