What are the treatment methods for multiple personality disorder? As early as the 19th century, physicians such as D. Perey (1840), Plummer (1859), and Azam (1887) documented that most patients with multiple personalities require years of treatment before showing improvement, and the condition is notoriously difficult to treat. However, in recent years, several therapeutic principles for treating multiple personality disorder have emerged as a result of personality disorder research.
1. Hypnotherapy proves more effective than classical psychoanalysis.
2. Treatment gains maximum momentum when the therapist establishes a positive transference relationship with the patient, avoiding aversion or hostility toward any of the personalities.
3. Encourage internal communication among dissociated personalities, as this facilitates dismantling the barriers between the primary and subsequent personalities.
4. The emergence of dissociated personalities often stems from unmet basic needs. The functional purpose of these needs must be considered, and they should not be dismissed lightly.
5. The therapist's responsibility is to help the patient redirect subsequent personalities back to their original purpose, thereby transforming the adversarial stance between subsequent personalities and the primary personality.
6. Manipulating or sowing discord between the primary and subsequent personalities is strictly prohibited, as such tactics typically lead to therapeutic failure.
7. Once formed, subsequent personalities fiercely resist all attempts to eradicate them. Therefore, therapists should not seek to eliminate them but instead focus on their identity with the primary personality, striving to integrate them so they function like normal emotional fluctuations.
8. Through catharsis, guide the primary personality back to assume responsibility for previously unacceptable anger, dissatisfaction, impulses, etc., and address them through more constructive means. Since the process of inducing the primary personality also involves releasing the secondary personality, the barrier between them will naturally dissolve, enabling communication.
It is particularly important to note that despite growing interest in multiple personality research, this remains one of the most challenging areas to understand and address within personality disorders.