The Alternative Model for Personality Disorders in DSM-5 – A Promising Basis for the Development of New Psychoeducational and Pharmacolocical Approaches in the Treatment of Patients with Personality Disorders and Accentuations?

With a prevalence of 10 – 15 percent (Fiedler, 2016) personality disorders are a common phenomenon. In addition to psychotherapy as method of choice, the AWMF-guidelines (Gaebel & Falkai, 2009) explicitly recommend psychoeducation about the diagnosis and describes possibilities for a pharmacological treatment for specific clusters of symptoms. But then in everyday's clinical practice, the categorical approach of personality disorder assessment carries difficulties concerning validity, reliability and stigmatization of patients. Therefore an alternative model for the description and classification of personality disorders was developed in coordination of H. Saß and M. Zaudig and got published in the DSM-5 Section III. Personality Disorders are characterized there by five dimensions of pathological personality traits and by an impairment in the level of personality functioning. We want to discuss possibilities to develop new psychoeducational and pharmacological treatment approaches targeting the pathological personality traits negative affectivity, detachment, antagonism, disinhibition and psychoticism, as specified in the section III-model. We present results from a pilot-evaluation of a novel psychoeducational group program – based on the alternative DSM-5 model. Patients report an increase in insight in own personality traits and in motivation for a further preoccupation with their own personality traits by participating in the group program.