The Effectiveness of Group Compassion-Focused Therapy (CFT) on Internalized Shame in Patients with Psoriasis

Psoriasis is a prevalent, inflammatory and chronic disease which is accompanied by various psychological problems for the patient. So far, few psychological interventions have been designed and conducted for reducing mental problems and enhancing mental health among these patients. Compassion-focused therapy is a new therapeutic method which was formed with the aim of reducing self-criticism and shame in individuals. According to the fact that patients with psoriasis experience great shame due to undesirable effects of this disease on their beauty, therefore, the present study was conducted by the aim of investigating the effectiveness of group compassion-focused therapy (CFT) on internalized shame in patients with psoriasis.

In the frame of a semi-experimental study with pretest-posttest-follow up with control group design, 40 patients with psoriasis referring to the specialized dermatology clinics of Hakim Jarjani hospital and Shahid Sayad Shirazi hospital in Gorgan, Iran, in 2018, were selected by available sampling method, and then, they were assigned into two experiment and control groups (20 subjects per group). For gathering the data, Cook’s internalized shame scale was used which was completed by the subjects of both groups in pretest, posttest and one-month follow up stages. The subjects of the experiment group received eight 2-hour sessions of compassion focused therapy while the control group received no therapy until the end of the follow up stage. For analyzing the data, the Variance analysis test with repeated measures in SPSSv20 were used.

Mean and standard deviation of the scores of internalized shame in subjects of the experiment group was 77.40 ± 3.53 in pretest, 62 ± 3.37 in posttest, and 60.50 ± 3.63 in follow up. In the control group, mean and standard deviation of the scores of internalized shame was 77.25 ± 5.04 in pretest, 78.65 ± 4.20 in posttest and 76.85 ± 4.67 in follow up. Results of the variance analysis with repeated measures indicated that compassion focused therapy led to significant reduction in internalized shame among patients of the intervention group in posttest and follow up stages (P < 0.01).

According to the findings of the present research, it is recommended that compassion focused therapy would be used in specialized dermatology clinics for the purpose of reducing mental problems and improving mental health among dermatological patients.