A service evaluation of short-term mentalisation based treatment for personality disorder

Background: People with personality disorder experience long waiting times for access to psychological treatments, resulting from a limited availability of long-term psychotherapies and a paucity of evidence-based brief interventions. Mentalisation-based treatment (MBT) is an efficacious therapeutic modality for personality disorder, but little is known about its viability as a short-term treatment. Aims: We aimed to evaluate mental health, client satisfaction and psychological functioning outcomes before and after a 10-week group MBT programme as part of a stepped-care out-patient personality disorder service. Method: We examined routinely collected pre–post treatment outcomes from 176 individuals (73% female) aged 20–63 years, attending a dedicated out-patient personality disorder service, who completed MBT treatment. Participants completed assessments examining mentalising capacity, client satisfaction, emotional reactivity, psychiatric symptom distress and social functioning. Results: Post-MBT outcomes suggested increased mentalising capacity (mean difference 5.1, 95% CI 3.4–6.8, P Conclusions: Short-term MBT as a low-intensity treatment for personality disorder was associated with positive pre–post treatment changes in social and psychological functioning. MBT as deployed in this out-patient service expands access to personality disorder treatment.