The Day Therapy Center (Centre Thérapeutique de Jour, CTJ) in the adult psychiatric ward at Hôpitaux Civils de Colmar (HCC) receives patients in a day hospital or outpatients.

Missions

The Day Therapy Center (Centre Thérapeutique de Jour, CTJ) in the adult psychiatric ward at Colmar Civil Hospital (Hôpitaux Civils de Colmar) has diverse missions.

Neuropsychological assessment

Cognitive impairment is the best predictive factor of functional outcomes. Cognitive testing therefore helps assess cognitive functioning impairments caused by mood disorder to increase the quality of life of patients and their relatives and friends.

Cognitive assessment

Cognitive assessment helps

• understand the origin of the disorder,
• establish a differential diagnosis (dementia, iatrogenesis, anxiety disorder, etc.),
• define a baseline,
• react to a patient complaint or to the detection of cognitive and/or functional impairments by a caregiver,
• advise the patient and/or his relatives, friends, co-workers or caregivers,
• implement rehabilitation techniques and give orientation.

Cognitive remediation in individual therapy

Cognitive functions improvements have positive impacts on the patient’s socio-professional reinsertion. Individual sessions aim at restoring personal, social and professional autonomy (as much as possible) by designing and applying specific strategies and techniques, thus reducing disorders and make the best of preserved abilities.

Cognitive stimulation workshop

A cognitive stimulation workshop is organized to stimulate outpatients’ cognitive functions. We therefore work on:

• ability to concentrate and pay attention;
• executive functioning: abstraction, mental flexibility, planning, reasoning, problem solving;
• memory: immediate memory, working memory, autobiographical memory, semantic memory;
• language: understanding, speaking, writing;
• perceptions

Therapeutic education and group discussions

They make use of the most relevant aspects of other psychotherapies:

• early detection of symptoms,
• routinization of life habits,
• improvement of therapeutic link and compliance,
• symptoms treatment,
• problem solving.

Advice, training and support

Parallel to the patient cognitive assessment and treatment, it is essential to offer advice, information and support to the patients and their relatives, friends, co-workers and caregivers. The benefits of the cognitive treatment can therefore be applied to every aspect of everyday life (functional outcomes of cognitive impairments, compensatory strategies used by relatives, information on cognitive effects of psycho-active drugs, etc.).

Information and training

Diverse activities focusing on cognitive impairments in patients with psychiatric disorder are organized in order to

• consider cognitive impairments and their functional outcomes in the patient’s overall treatment,
• understand how these impairments impact diagnosis, therapeutic observance and nursing or doctor interview,
• raise awareness to perform necessary complementary tests or to refer the patient to other departments (neurology, geriatrics, imaging, etc.)

Target population

Patients can be sent by an HCC or outside (non-hospital) health professional. Patients may get an appointment from the CTJ secretariat.

Programs offered

Activities are organized in diverse groups. Several groups have been designed to focus on bipolar disorders (recognized by the ARS in February 2011). One group focuses on depression, one group trains social skills and self-expression, and one group deals with cognitive behavioral therapies.

BIPOL-COLMAR

Discussion, information and advice group for bipolar patients and their relatives - Its main objectives are relapse prevention (manic/hypomanic/mixed-manic episodes and depressions) and hospitalization. Provided information helps fight the symptoms.

Post office protocol

Psychotherapy program with personal objectives for patients with bipolar disorder. Its objectives are:

• improving disorder outcomes using better treatment tools, which requires the patient’s active involvement in the treatment,
• improving functional outcomes by directly helping patients meet social and professional objectives and acquire better quality of life which are previously hampered by the disorder.

IDEM-Depression group

IDEM-Depression group (Information, Discovery, Exchange and Mobilization group on depression) is intended for inpatients or outpatients. Its objectives are to:

• increase knowledge on depression and help patients cope with depression using experiment and discovery (IDEM’s I for Information and D for Discovery),
• help the decentering process using exchanges and by presenting depression as a real disease with temporary clinical signs (IDEM’s Exchange),
• raise awareness on therapeutic approaches (IDEM’s M for Mobilization and discovery).

Training group on social skills and self-expression

The training group on social skills and self-expression helps:

• acquire psychosocial skills (treatment observance, physical appearance, hygiene, leisure organization, etc.),
• interpersonal problem solving (decision-making, problem-solving, assertiveness, etc.)
• acquire skills in every-day activities (autonomy, quality of life, etc.).

Cognitive Behavioral Therapies (CBT)

CBTs use various learning theories and cognitive science theories and are therefore a complement to a neuropsychological approach. Techniques developed by CBTs are particularly useful for anxiety disorders, OCDs, phobias and mood disorders. Most of the work consist in identifying automatic thinking and thinking schema which may limit functioning. It also focuses on designing alternative schema, more flexible and more adaptable.

Contact

Address:
39 avenue de la Liberté 68024 Colmar Cedex
Telephone: 03 89 12 40 00
Website: www.ch-colmar.fr