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Our Services
Psychotherapy
  What is Psychotherapy?
Psychotherapy is a treatment relying on your own capacity to bring about changes in your life. The therapist’s role is to guide and support you to get new insight into your health problems and to teach you skills of how to fight your illness.
What problems do we treat with psychotherapy?
A lot of sleep disorders are triggered or maintained by psychological factors. These may be for example worry, anxiety, stress or depression. Sometimes there is a strong psychological component in why people cannot adhere to the best treatment of a sleep condition, for example using a CPAP machine. It is also happens that even the best medications do not solve the sleep condition because strong emotions overpower the medications’ biological effect.
We recommend psychotherapy if you have a primary sleep problem (sleep difficulty without any medical illness) or secondary sleep problem (your sleep disorder accompanied by medical or psychological conditions). We successfully treat the following conditions with psychotherapy:
Clinical depression is an illness characterized by overwhelming sadness or decreased ability to enjoy everyday activities of life, including work, recreation or sex. Sleep problems are very common in depression. Psychotherapy can treat your depression and sleep difficulties at the same time. The treatment is time limited (about 15 sessions) and is often of long-term benefit.
Worry during the day or in the evening may prevent you from having a good night sleep. Psychotherapy teaches you how to live with healthy, adaptive anxiety and how to reduce the non-helpful, stressful worry in your everyday life. The length of treatment – depending on the type of anxiety problem – is estimated to be between 5 and 20 sessions.
Obesity is a condition that increases the risk of a range of medical problems, including sleep apnea. If you have obesity you may have experienced psychological difficulties besides your medical problems, for example problems with controlling your food intake, low self-esteem, low mood, or personal trauma in your past. We offer short-term and long-term group therapy for people who struggle with obesity and for patients who are candidates for or have had weight-reducing (bariatric) surgery.
What are the advantages of psychotherapy?
- It is effective. Psychotherapy in most cases is as at least as effective treatment of the above conditions as medication, or provides the most effective solution in combination with medication.
- It is a long-term solution. Research studies have consistently shown that people experience further improvement even a year after they finish psychotherapy and its effect carries on.
- It is about you. Psychotherapy is about your individual life situation, your emotions, your family situation, goals and needs. In psychotherapy you will be listened to and be respected for who you are and as such, you will feel empowered.
- It does not have chemical side effects.
Any disadvantages of psychotherapy?
- You may start to feel the effects of psychotherapy later than those of medication (but it often is effective long after you finish the psychotherapy treatment).
- It requires time commitment (sessions are usually 50 - 60 minutes long)
- It requires your active contribution (you need to talk about your experiences and may need to complete homework)
- It may require payment, but it is cheaper than medication in the long run.
What psychotherapy services are available?
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Individual counseling for insomnia, nightmares, late bedtime and daytime sleepiness of adolescents, psychological adjustment to CPAP treatment, anxiety, depression, chronic stress and relationship issues
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Short –term insomnia cognitive-behavior therapy groups
Group facilitators: Dr Louis van Zyl and Dora Zalai
We run 8 session cognitive behavior therapy groups for people with insomnia. The group meets on Fridays from 3.30 pm to 4.45 pm at the Conference Room of the Sleep and Alertness Clinic. This is a focused program addressing the dysfunctional thoughts, believes, fears and behaviors that contribute to the development and maintenance of insomnia and daytime functional impairment.
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Long-term group therapy for people with insomnia
Group facilitators: Dr Colin Shapiro and Dr Azmeh Shahid
We run a chronic insomnia group every Tuesday form 5-6 pm. This is a group of about 8 patients who have chronic insomnia. The group is a psychologically oriented and diverse. It offers a supportive platform to the participants and helps them communicate and share their sleep related and everyday life issues. The group has been active over the last 10 years. Most patients in this group have been a part of it for more than a year.
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Long-term group therapy for people with obesity
Group facilitators: Dr Colin Shapiro
Our open-ended group of overweight/obese people meets every Thursday form 5 pm to 6 pm in the Conference room of the Sleep and Alertness Clinic. The group has 10-15 regular members. The goal of the group is not immediate weight loss; rather the exploration of everyday life events, triggers, stressors, psychological and medical factors that contribute to their obesity. The atmosphere of the group is supportive where members feels to belong, accepted and respected. Most members- as they feel ready for it- start losing weight by resolving their psychological issues, leading a healthier lifestyle, following diet programs or choosing bariatric surgery.
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Short-term groups for people with impulse control problems
This group has been running out of the Neuropsychiatry program at the Toronto Western Hospital since September 2009. The group runs on a continuous basis in a semi open format. We cater to individuals who have had difficulty controlling their impulses in the area of drug and alcohol use, anger and aggression, gambling and sexual impulsivity, shop lifting and impulse dyscontrol secondary to brain injury. The group has catered to men only so far but will not exclude women who may be suitable. The delivery is through cognitive behavioral principles. For further information contact Dr. Julian Gojer at 416 323 9939.
Group facilitators: Dr Julian Gojer and Dora Zalai
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Support group for people who have narcolepsy
Coming soon
I would like to try psychotherapy. What is the next step?
If you prefer psychotherapy as the treatment for your sleep problem, please
- Call (416) 603-5800, ext 2148
- ask your physician to refer you to our counselors and group therapists
- ask your family physician to refer you for psychotherapy or sleep assessment to the Sleep and Alertness Clinic with this referral form
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