Innovative Practice in Forensic Settings: A Cognitive Analytic Approach to Effective Relational Work

Working in forensic services requires clinicians to deal with complex trauma on both a professional and personal basis. Professionally, they must care for and rehabilitate people who have not only experienced trauma but also behaved in traumatic ways toward others. And on a personal level, they are inevitably touched by this trauma - by reliving it in dialogue, or by observing its effects. A key challenge they face is to build strong therapeutic relationships with those for whom past relationships have faltered and often become incendiary. Innovative Practice in Forensic Settings explores issues of how to simultaneously hold in mind risk, safety and vulnerability, and how to maintain a capacity to think alongside a capacity to feel. Focusing on a relational and contextual understanding of trauma and offending, the chapters explore how to make use of a CAT approach across different forensic settings, clinical presentations and services.

Jamie Kirkland is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist in the Division of Forensic Mental Health and Learning Disabilities with NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, where he is the lead for reflective practice. He is a CAT Trainer and Supervisor, and co-Director of CAT Training Scotland. He has applied CAT in secure settings and with community learning disability teams, and has a strong interest creating reflective spaces for multi-disciplinary staff teams. Jenny Marshall is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist at Ridgway Hospital, Tees, Esk and Wear Valleys NHS Trust, and an accredited CAT Practitioner and Supervisor. She has a long history of working in low and medium secure services with people with mental disorders, and she has a strong interest in the application of the CAT model to reflective practice. She works with Catalyse, a social enterprise offering CAT training, therapy and consultancy through a network of expertise across northern England.