About The Course
Psychodynamic Psychotherapy and Psychopharmacology integrates relational understanding with contemporary psychiatric care. This course examines unconscious processes, attachment, trauma, and defence mechanisms, showing how psychodynamic formulation informs assessment and treatment planning. You will explore how transference, countertransference, and meaning effects influence prescribing, adherence, and resistance, bringing psychotherapy and pharmacotherapy together in complex clinical presentations.
Who Is This Course For?
This course is suitable for:
- Psychiatrists
- General Practitioners (GPs)
- Mental Health Nurse Practitioners (MHNPs)
- Psychologists
- Mental health professionals
- Clinicians working in or expanding into psychiatry and mental health care
Accreditation Information:
- Psychiatry Accreditation: This course is available for self-accreditation with the RANZCP and other relevant psychiatric and mental health organisations.
- GP Accreditation: This course is available for self-accreditation with RACGP for general practitioners.
- On completion of this course, participants will receive a course completion certificate and 3.5 CPD hours (EA 2.25, RP 0.75, MO 0.5)
What You'll Learn
On completion of this course, you will be able to:
- Describe the core principles of psychodynamic psychotherapy, including unconscious processes, transference, resistance, and defence mechanisms, and relate them to contemporary neuroscience of memory and attachment.
- Explain how implicit memory, early attachment experiences, and psychological trauma shape personality, relational patterns, and symptom formation, and how these are addressed within the therapeutic relationship.
- Construct a concise psychodynamic formulation that integrates biological, psychological, and social determinants of illness and links them to clinical presentation and treatment planning.
- Differentiate supportive and expressive psychodynamic interventions and select an appropriate balance across the course of treatment according to patient capacities and clinical context.
- Identify psychodynamic factors that influence prescribing, including transference, countertransference, resistance, non-adherence, and placebo/nocebo effects.
- Summarise principles of psychodynamic psychopharmacology to recognise and manage pharmacological treatment resistance, particularly when it arises from meaning, relationships, and patient subjectivity, rather than biology alone.
- Summarise how integrating combined treatment (psychotherapy plus pharmacotherapy) in complex cases and recognising how a dynamic understanding of the patient and the alliance can improve adherence, reduce nocebo responses, and enhance outcomes
- Outline a strategy to reflect on and utilise countertransference, consultation, and team processes to contain enactments and avoid countertherapeutic prescribing in treatment-resistant and characterologically disturbed patients
Course Programme
7 Modules | 40 Units | 3.5 hours total length
- Core principles of psychodynamic psychotherapy
- Psychodynamic formulation within the biopsychosocial model
- Neuroscience of attachment, trauma, and implicit memory
- Evolution and evidence base of psychodynamic therapy
- Introduction to psychodynamic psychopharmacology
- Attachment, trauma, and personality in psychiatric presentations
- Implicit memory and relational patterns
- Treatment resistance and non-adherence beyond biology
- Neural restructuring and therapeutic change
- Placebo, nocebo, and meaning effects in prescribing
- Defence mechanisms and hierarchy of functioning
- Splitting, projection, and projective identification
- Transference and countertransference in clinical care
- Managing transference and countertransference
- Case-based application in clinical settings
- Conducting a psychodynamic assessment
- Identifying unconscious processes in assessment
- Principles of psychodynamic formulation
- The 5P model in clinical formulation
- Diagnosis and formulation: complementary roles
- Case-based formulation exercise
- Core therapeutic tasks: accepting, understanding, explaining
- Supportive and expressive interventions
- The therapeutic frame and boundaries
- The interpretive process and timing
- Reflective practice and supervision
- Integrating psychodynamic thinking into prescribing
- The meaning of medication and the “medication life”
- Alliance, readiness to change, and adherence
- Transference and countertransference in prescribing
- Managing resistance and nocebo responses
- Case-based prescribing applications
- Overview of the seven psychodynamic prescribing principles
- Mind–body integration in treatment
- Understanding the patient beyond diagnosis
- Exploring ambivalence and resistance
- Managing negative transference in prescribing
- Countertransference and prescribing enactments
- Reflective prescribing and clinical safeguards
- Knowledge Check (Assessment)
Course Description
Psychodynamic Psychotherapy and Psychopharmacology: Principles, Formulation, and Clinical Application
Psychodynamic Psychotherapy and Psychopharmacology is a clinically integrated course that brings psychodynamic thinking into contemporary psychiatric practice. It examines how unconscious processes, attachment, trauma, and relational patterns shape symptom expression, engagement with treatment, and clinical outcomes. This course supports clinicians in moving beyond symptom-based approaches towards a more nuanced, formulation-driven model of assessment and management.
Foundations of Psychodynamic Practice
This course begins with core principles of psychodynamic psychotherapy, including defence mechanisms, transference and countertransference, and resistance. These are explored alongside contemporary neuroscience, particularly implicit memory and attachment, to understand how early experience shapes affect regulation and relational patterns. This foundation provides a clinically relevant framework for understanding how symptoms emerge and are maintained within interpersonal and developmental contexts.
From Assessment to Psychodynamic Formulation
A central focus of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy and Psychopharmacology is the development of formulation skills. Participants will learn to construct concise, clinically useful formulations that integrate biological, psychological, and social determinants with developmental history and relational patterns. This approach strengthens diagnostic assessment, anticipates treatment challenges, and supports more precise and individualised care.
The course also examines how transference and countertransference emerge within assessment and treatment, and how these processes can be used to deepen understanding rather than disrupt care. Through case-based learning, clinicians develop confidence in applying psychodynamic formulation to complex presentations.
Psychodynamic Psychopharmacology and Clinical Application
A defining feature of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy and Psychopharmacology is its focus on prescribing within a relational and meaning-based framework. The course introduces principles of psychodynamic psychopharmacology, highlighting how transference and countertransference influence prescribing decisions, adherence, and treatment response.
Participants will examine how unconscious dynamics contribute to non-adherence, placebo and nocebo effects, and treatment resistance. By integrating psychodynamic formulation with prescribing practice, clinicians are better able to understand the patient’s relationship to medication, avoid countertherapeutic prescribing, and strengthen the therapeutic alliance.
This integrated approach emphasises combined treatment, where psychotherapy and pharmacotherapy are used together to improve outcomes in complex clinical presentations.
Applying Psychodynamic Principles in Practice
Across the programme, there is a consistent emphasis on applying psychodynamic thinking to assessment, formulation, therapeutic technique, and prescribing. The course concludes with key principles in psychodynamic pharmacotherapy, supporting clinicians to integrate biological treatment with relational understanding, reflective practice, and clinical judgement.
This approach provides a practical framework for managing complexity, strengthening therapeutic alliance, and improving adherence and treatment outcomes in everyday clinical care.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of this course, participants will be able to:
- Describe the core principles of psychodynamic psychotherapy, including unconscious processes, transference, resistance, and defence mechanisms, and relate them to contemporary neuroscience of memory and attachment.
- Explain how implicit memory, early attachment experiences, and psychological trauma shape personality, relational patterns, and symptom formation, and how these are addressed within the therapeutic relationship.
- Construct a concise psychodynamic formulation that integrates biological, psychological, and social determinants of illness and links them to clinical presentation and treatment planning.
- Differentiate supportive and expressive psychodynamic interventions and select an appropriate balance across the course of treatment according to patient capacities and clinical context.
- Identify psychodynamic factors that influence prescribing, including transference, countertransference, resistance, non-adherence, and placebo/nocebo effects.
- Summarise principles of psychodynamic psychopharmacology to recognise and manage pharmacological treatment resistance, particularly when it arises from meaning, relationships, and patient subjectivity, rather than biology alone.
- Summarise how integrating combined treatment (psychotherapy plus pharmacotherapy) in complex cases and recognising how a dynamic understanding of the patient and the alliance can improve adherence, reduce nocebo responses, and enhance outcomes
- Outline a strategy to reflect on and utilise countertransference, consultation, and team processes to contain enactments and avoid countertherapeutic prescribing in treatment-resistant and characterologically disturbed patients.
Explore the course to integrate psychodynamic thinking into prescribing and everyday clinical practice.
Related Courses:
- Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: Core Principles & Clinical Applications: This course develops core psychodynamic psychotherapy skills, including defence mechanisms, transference, and therapeutic technique, providing a foundation for the prescribing integration explored in this course.
- Unlocking the Power of Psychodynamic Psychotherapy – Insights and Principles in Clinical Practice: This course explores key psychodynamic concepts and their application in clinical practice, strengthening understanding of relational processes that underpin both psychotherapy and prescribing.
- Advanced Psychiatric Formulation and Strategic Management – A 2 Part Series: This advanced masterclass develops structured psychiatric formulation skills, integrating psychodynamic, neurobiological, and phenomenological perspectives to guide complex clinical decision-making.
Course release date: 11 May 2026 | Course expiration date: 10 May 2029 (The expiration date indicates when the course content is scheduled for review to ensure that it remains current and accurate.)
Integrate psychodynamic formulation with prescribing practice. Understand how transference and countertransference influence alliance, adherence, and treatment resistance in complex clinical care.
Course Information
- 3.5 hours
- 3.5 CPD
Inclusions
- 3.5 hours of structured course material
- Infographics and structured visual learning frameworks
- Case-based clinical application
- Interactive exercises, including drag-and-drop, and case-based activities
- Knowledge check (assessment)
- Post activity evaluation
- Certificate of completion
Material Downloads
- certificate
Instructors
Dr. Sanil Rege Course Editor and Reviewer MBBS, MRCPsych, FRANZCP
With extensive teaching experience through psychiatry education initiatives, Sanil is recognised as a motivational training facilitator and educator who promotes insightful collaboration and discussion
As the Academic Lead of Psych Scene and Chief Editor of Psych Scene Hub, he aspires to make a difference in mental health by empowering Healthcare Professionals to advance their skills and career through the provision of specialised education and training
Sanil is also founder of Vita Healthcare, a private clinic in Mount Eliza specialising in adult mental healthcare, with over 20 years of clinical experience and 13 years of private practice experience treating disorders across the spectrum. He currently works in the community, across in-patient, consultation-liaison and addiction psychiatry spaces.
Emma Vinton Course Developer - RMN, MPH FWCoN Nurse Consultant and Medical Writer
Emma is an experienced mental health nurse and medical writer with extensive clinical and academic expertise. She began her career in eating and affective disorders at Newcastle’s Royal Victoria Infirmary in the UK, before progressing into community mental health services and later, primary mental health care.
In addition to her clinical background, Emma completed a Master’s degree in Public Health in 2016 and a Postgraduate Diploma in Strategic Leadership in 2024. This combination of frontline experience and strategic insight underpins her work as a principal medical writer and educator.
Emma is deeply committed to the clinical user experience. Her work is designed to support meaningful engagement, so that learners move beyond theory to deliver care that is evidence-based and genuinely person-centred.
