Interventions are a sum of services, products, and activities aimed at imparting knowledge about healthy lifestyle changes to reduce the prevalence of medical conditions in at risk populations. Interventions target individuals, groups, and families and each is applied depending on the nature of the risk population and how it affects the people around them. Individual interventions include educational processes, training, exercises and other activities that involve active participation between the patients and the patient on a one on one basis. Family interventions aim at strengthening the patient's support system and ensuring that the care givers know how to handle the risk population without their well being negatively affected in the process. Group intervention work with bringing together people in the at risk group and designing collective ways of helping them like therapy, health service provision or other behavior modifying activities.
Working with individuals during the interventions can include therapy aimed at behavioral change or medical interventions designed to help the body fight off the impacts of the risk behavior and avoid future attacks (Cruwys, Haslam, Fox & Mcmahon, 2015). Therapy involves seeing a psychologist who guides the victim through several sessions and diagnoses the root of the problem and advancing treatment aimed at fostering positive mental health to encourage the behavior change (Nielsen, 2013). Medical interventions include treatments like rehabilitation centers whereby the patient is admitted and helped to overcome their condition and to transition back into society with the skills to prevent the recurrence of the condition (Kossek, Hammer, Kelly & Moen, 2014). When working with families, family therapy entails visiting a psychologist together to help them solve their issues. The family can also see a psychologist or another health provider to learn of ways to help and become caregivers to a family member who is part of an at risk population. Group interventions include support group therapy and interpersonal process groups (Nielsen, 2013). Group interventions bring together the people sharing similar characteristics, and they share and encourage each other during the healing process.
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A family intervention can also take a non-medical approach whereby family members come together to talk to the affected person and support and encourage them to get help and change their behavior (Nielsen, 2013). Group intervention can take the form of a group therapy whereby the risk population seeks the help of a counselor or a psychologist to overcome the similar issues they undergo. The different kinds of intervention have distinct characteristics (Nielsen, 2013). Family interventions involve the victim working together with people they’re familiar with while group interventions involve working with people the victim may not be familiar with. Individual interventions concentrate only on the victim while family interventions concentrate on the victim and those around them (Cruwys et.al., 2015). Individual and group interventions entail the seeking of professional help from qualified people like psychologists and counselors while a family intervention can be done by a group of relatives who are concerned about the victim without professional skills.
The success rates of the interventions vary and are largely determined by the willingness of the victim to accept help (Kossek et.al., 2014). The success of individual interventions as in the other types of interventions is higher when the person is highly committed to change. Research indicates that an integration of cognitive-behavioral and skill building intervention programs is highly effective. In the individual and group interventions, the patients get better results when the therapists or counselors integrate activities into the sessions. The success of the interventions is also dependent on the risk principle which states that individuals should be treated according to their risk levels (Nielsen, 2013). The most successful interventions assess the individual risks and needs which guide the formulation of the most effective responses to the problem. The assessment is based on the triggering factors like history of the condition in the family or the individual's life, personality traits that could encourage the behavior, the people the victim hangs around with and their attitude towards the pro social behavior. Therefore when the family or professionals assess the factors, they determine the appropriate approach to treat the person with be it individual or group therapy (Cruwys et.al. 2015). An evaluation of the success of the intervention methods is determined by the approach taken and judged by the impacts the intervention has on all the stakeholders involved.
The use of therapy as an intervention method is common to the individual, family and group interventions (Kossek et.al. 2014). A therapist uses different techniques during an intervention to bring change in the patient including cognitive behavioral therapy, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy or psychodynamic therapy. To conduct successful interventions, they need a certain set of skills (Nielsen, 2013). The educational skills include a Doctorate in psychology and counseling, they should have accrued enough supervised hours, and they must pass the professional practice for psychology exams to practice as licensed therapists. The personal skills required include great listening skills, be empathetic, strong interpersonal skills and ability to interact with people at all levels, excellent communication skills, confidentiality, critical and fast thinking and problem-solving skills (Johnson & Kaslow, 2014). Therapists, therefore, need to possess a combination of personal and educational skills to succeed in conducting the interventions.
The field of psychology is guided by certain values and ethics which affect the success of the interventions (Johnson & Kaslow, 2014). These values include fidelity and responsibility, competency, integrity, respect for other people’s dignity and rights, acting with transparency and professionally and altruism in their practice. The psychologists should observe patient confidentiality, avoid conflicts of interest, not discriminate against their patients based on gender, color, religion or creed or any other proscribed laws and they should not form unprofessional relationships with patients (Johnson & Kaslow, 2014). The values and ethics contribute to the success of the interventions since they make the patients trustful and honest since their confidentiality is assured. They also ensure that the therapist puts patients’ interest first which means that they work towards achieving the best health outcomes for the people undergoing the inventions (Johnson & Kaslow, 2014). The ethics and values, therefore, form a crucial part in the formation of the relationship between the therapist and the people undergoing the interventions.
In sum, the intervention process can be individual, group or a family intervention. The two interventions for working with individuals include therapeutic and medical interventions, and group interventions include support group therapy and interpersonal process groups. Family interventions include informal interventions and family therapy. To become a therapist educational and personal skills are required including education, competence, integrity, and professionalism.
References
Cruwys, T., Haslam, S. A., Fox, N. E., & Mcmahon, H. (2015). “That's not what we do”: Evidence that normative change is a mechanism of action in group interventions. Behaviour Research and Therapy, 65 , 11-17. doi:10.1016/j.brat.2014.12.003 Kossek, E.
Johnson, W. B., & Kaslow, N. J. (2014). The Oxford handbook of education and training in professional psychology . Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Kossek, E. E., Hammer, L. B., Kelly, E. L., & Moen, P. (2014). Designing Work, Family & Health Organizational Change Initiatives. Organizational Dynamics, 43 (1), 53-63. doi:10.1016/j.orgdyn.2013.10.007
Nielsen, K. (2013). How can we make organizational interventions work? Employees and line managers as actively crafting interventions. Human Relations, 66 (8), 1029-1050. doi:10.1177/0018726713477164
