title: Effectiveness of education programs in changing clinicians' attitudes toward treating borderline personality disorder.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  This exploratory study was conducted in Australia and New Zealand and examined the impact of two types of education programs (cognitive-behavioral and psychoanalytic) on clinicians' attitude toward deliberate self-harm behaviors in borderline personality disorder and toward working with patients with this disorder.
  
  
  METHODS
  The Attitudes Towards Deliberate Self-Harm Questionnaire was used to assess the attitudes of mental health and emergency medicine clinicians (N=65) before and after attending an education program and at the six-month follow-up.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Compared with participants in the control group (N=22), participants in the cognitive-behavioral program (N=18) showed significant improvement in attitudes immediately after attending the program (p=.02), as did participants in the psychoanalytic education program (N=25) (p<.01). However, the six-month follow-up revealed that only the psychoanalytic education group maintained significant changes in attitude (p<.05).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Results are discussed in terms of the use of relatively brief educational interventions in facilitating enduring attitude change toward working with patients with borderline personality disorder.
authors: School of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Psychological Medicine, Monash University, c/o Ballan District Health and Care, 33 Cowie St., Ballan, Victoria 3342, Australia. mcandpt@bigpond.net.au
authors: Amanda Jane Commons
authors: AJ
authors: Treloar
mesh_terms: D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D001315:Australia; D001883:Borderline Personality Disorder / Q000188:drug therapy*; D005260:Female; D006282:Health Personnel / Q000193:education*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D009520:New Zealand; D015397:Program Evaluation / Q000379:methods*; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires