[Interacting with patients with a personality disorder: 10 tips]

Personality disorders have a high prevalence. The behaviour of patients with a personality disorder may make it difficult for doctors to maintain a professional attitude, which may lead to a breakdown in the therapeutic relationship. In order to prevent an imbalance in the therapeutic relationship, we describe in this paper 10 tips for interacting appropriately with patients with a personality disorder in general medical practice. We divide these into three domains. In the first domain we deal with the organisation of care, which should ideally be safe and predictable because unpredictability and unreliability can easily upset these patients. In the second domain recommendations on the attitude of the doctor are given: it should ideally be investigative and inviting but also involve boundaries. In the third domain we advise doctors to monitor the quality of the therapeutic relationship and to restore it if necessary.