Therapeutic intensification in post-traumatic stress disorder worldwide: where do we stand?

Background: First-line treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are trauma-focused psychotherapies. To overcome the limitations of these approaches, intensive and massed programmes have shown promising outcomes.Objective: To provide a structured narrative literature review on recent advances in intensive and massed programmes for psychological trauma over the past five years.Methods: All clinical studies investigating massed or intensive therapies were included, including qualitative research.Results: Two main approaches of intensive or massed programmes have emerged, mainly in North America and Europe. These two models differ in their modalities (individual vs. group-based interventions) and in the extent of validation across diverse populations. Across the two approaches, both therapeutic alliance and trauma-related negative cognitions predict treatment response.Conclusion: Current evidence supports the continued use of intensive and massed programmes and underscores the need to further develop and refine them to address existing limitations.