Allegheny County DBT for Adults as Partners in Treatment (ADAPT)

ADAPT offers full or comprehensive dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) to adults who live in Allegheny County, Pa. An introduction to ADAPT can be found here.

ADAPT is for those who have Medicaid insurance and find themselves using mental health services often without great benefit.

Frequent mental health services include:

• Emergency Department visits.
• Medical or psychiatric hospitalization.
• Shelters and residential care homes.

What Is DBT?

DBT is an evidenced-based form of cognitive-behavioral therapy that focuses on changing destructive or self-damaging behaviors and helping people move towards their own personal life goals.

Comprehensive DBT is one of the most researched and best supported treatments for people who have severe, complicated, and/or emotional problems such as life-threatening behavior including suicide attempts and self-harm.

DBT can be very helpful for people who have more than one mental health disorder where standard therapy/counseling and medicine have not helped.

DBT focuses on how to:

• Work towards your life goals.
• Develop healthy ways to cope with stress.
• Manage disruptive or intense emotions.
• Improve relationships with others.

What Can I Expect at ADAPT?

Full treatment of DBT usually takes between six months and year, and includes four parts:

• Specialized, one-on-one DBT therapy.
• Group DBT skills training.
• Phone coaching with your therapist between visits.
• ADAPT therapists attend weekly consultation team meetings to discuss your care and provide the best therapy to meet your unique needs.

Once admitted to ADAPT, you will have the opportunity to meet with our program psychiatrist.

How Do I Know if Comprehensive DBT Is Right for Me?

DBT might be right for you if you say "yes" to any of the following:

• Have you tried common mental health treatments, such as therapy/counseling or medications, but they didn't help enough?
• Do you have self-harm behaviors that you can't seem to stop?
• Are relationships with people sometimes intense and difficult?
• Do you end up in hospitals often and without very much long-term benefit?
• Have you been in other DBT skills training groups that didn't include all four parts of comprehensive DBT without success?

Contact ADAPT

To learn more about DBT and the ADAPT program, please call 412-246-5600.

Provider Referrals

To refer a patient to UPMC Western Psychiatric Hospital’s ADAPT program, please fill out our referral form (PDF).