How Is Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD) Treated?

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is usually treated with a combination of psychotherapy and medication management. In this video, psychiatrist Sue Varma, MD, discusses how cognitive behavioral therapy and SSRI medications can work to treat OCD.

Transcript

00:00

Obsessive compulsive disorder is usually treated with a combination of psychotherapy and medication management.

00:06

And when we talk about psychotherapy, it's usually cognitive behavioral therapy, which is a short-term, time-limited, very interactive

00:14

type of therapy that has to do with your thoughts, your feelings, and your behavior. So the idea is, is that if somebody is feeling anxious,

00:23

you really want to expose them to that anxiety to sort of desensitize them. And we do different types of experiment,

00:29

where we allow people to feel greater and greater amounts of anxiety, and expect them that over time they will habituate to it--

00:36

so not indulging in the obsessions or the compulsion. Mindfulness is a very important part of this,

00:43

and medication, specifically the SSRIs or selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors.