Therapy-Interfering Interfering Behavior

Therapy-interfering behavior (TIB), although commonly encountered in clinical practice, often goes unaddressed. But if behaviors preventing treatment engagement are not addressed, patients will struggle to achieve their treatment goals, will remain at high chronic risk for suicide, and may drop out of treatment. Therefore, to truly help our patients approach their stated goals and target suicide risk, it is critical to address TIB. In this first column of a 2-part series, we discuss how to identify TIBs in both patients and providers to facilitate therapeutic risk management of patients at risk for suicide.