Working with Complexity associated with Borderline Personality Disorder

This is a free event designed for members of the public clinical mental health workforce in Victoria, (staff employed at Area Mental Health Services, Forensicare or mental health staff from RCH). For example, a social worker working in mental health at Austin Health. Staff from MHCSSs, ACCHOs, AOD or other partner organisations may sometimes also attend. Please note, if you do register for this event and it is not clear you are part of the intended audience, your registration will be confirmed two weeks prior to the event start date, or earlier.

Note: Spectrum has a lived experience panel that meet monthly and a part-time carer consultant. Members of the lived experience panel and the carer consultant are consulted in the development of Spectrum training materials.

The Working with Complexity Training has been developed for mental health clinicians working with people with BPD.

This training involves a combination of didactic, dialogical and experiential training styles and activities, highlighting the following practice issues for effective support of people with a BPD diagnosis: the DSM-5 and ICD-11 diagnoses, a developmental understanding of BPD the complexities entailed by working effectively within and between teams and services that support people with BPD, the interactions between co-existing conditions with BPD, maintaining a recovery, person-focused approach when working with severe risk, common treatment principles and skills, creating a therapeutic frame and continuous reflective practice.

Recognise the influence of working with BPD on themselves as both a person and a practitioner, particularly with regards to the use of self, transference and counter transference and working in one on one and team contexts.

On completion of this workshop participants will be able to:

• Work with BPD and its co-occurring physical and psychological presentations in the current Australian context, utilising the ICD-11 and DSM-5frameworks
• Utilise the principles of working with BPD and complexity to create structure and focus for interventions that can be applied in their novel settings
• Recognise and work with complexity within and between systems (emergency services, mental health services, inpatient units/ long term care facilities, child protection, Justice/ forensic system, NDIA/NDIS) and the broader system at large
• Recognise the links between complexity and risk in working with BPD often founded in attachment and relational trauma and how literacy in these matters can assist with the development of appropriate treatment and recovery options
• Recognise and respond appropriately to high risk behaviours including frequent non-suicidal self-injury / suicidality and the need for inpatient admission and extended care settings

Pre-Requisites: Previous experience or training in working with people with BPD, e.g. Foundation Training with Working with People with BPD.

The training will not cover foundational information in detail and it is expected you will have some understanding around the bio-psychosocial theory of the diagnosis of BPD as well as basic treatment principles.

Delivery Mode – Online via Zoom

There will be experiential activities, role plays and group discussions in addition to dialogical lecture-style delivering

Presenter:

Spectrum Personality Disorder Service

Marianne Weddell is Acting Clinical Manager of Spectrum and Clinical Psychologist with 20 years’ experience in public and private setting treating a wide range of disorders, managing teams, training staff and supervising/mentoring clinicians. She has a special interest and significant experience with borderline personality disorder, in particular developing service and family systems to work effectively in this space. She believes in therapy as a tool to help people understand themselves, their passions and build a life worth living.

Deborah Dick is a Senior Psychiatric Nurse with more than two decades’ experience in mental health working in a variety of areas including inpatient, community, and crisis settings. Deborah has worked at Spectrum for over 20 years providing consultation to public mental health services, training and direct treatment for clients and families. She has been involved in developing specific courses for nurses working in mental health and has contributed to various nursing text books.