Seeking Safety: The Benefits of Gender-specific versus Co-Educational Therapy (Rapid Review)

Seeking Safety is a therapeutic approach for addressing co-occurring substance use disorder (SUD) and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) that focuses on establishing safety for the individual (Najavits, 2002). Seeking Safety is a manualized therapy, which means that a manual is followed to ensure that treatment follows the same steps for each session. It combines cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) and psychodynamic psychotherapy. Seeking Safety includes a therapist guide and patient materials on 25 topics covering cognitive, behavioural and interpersonal challenges and coping skills for PTSD and SUD. The program topics are independent of each other, so sessions can be tailored to focus on the topics that are identified as most pertinent by the counsellor, the client or both. The approach can also be offered in either an individual or group format.