Cognitive behavioral therapy for comorbidity and transdiagnostic populations

Transdiagnostic and integrated treatments have emerged as recommended approaches for the treatment of a number of co-occurring mental health disorders, as they provide a more parsimonious and arguably more efficacious approach to working with comorbid and transdiagnostic presentations. This chapter has presented models for the treatment of comorbid and transdiagnostic cases within a single class of diagnoses, classes of diagnoses that share common features, and more distinct but commonly co-occurring diagnoses. This review provides an initial framework to conceptualize and consider the most effective treatment strategies for co-occurring disorders. Considerable work remains to refine existing transdiagnostic interventions and develop efficacious transdiagnostic interventions for other commonly comorbid diagnoses. Despite the frequency with which comorbid diagnoses occur, most treatment development focuses on interventions for single specific diagnoses. Evidence based cognitive-behavioral therapy protocols have been developed for each of the major anxiety disorders. Eating disorders (EDs) are "characterized by a persistent disturbance of eating or eating-related behavior that results in the altered consumption or absorption of food and that significantly impairs physical health or psychosocial functioning" in DSM-5. Emotional disorders can be conceptualized as systems in humans that protect an individual from current or future threats to their safety or security.