Adult day clinic

A warm welcome to the website for the adult day clinic at the Oberwallis Centre for Psychiatry in Brig, Switzerland.

We are delighted that you are interested in what we have to offer here at our adult day clinic in the heart of Brig.
We have made every effort to give you as comprehensive a picture as possible of the therapy we offer.
If you have any questions at all, please feel free to give us a call or write to us.

The adult day clinic is part of the Oberwallis centre for psychiatry (Psychiatriezentrum Oberwallis or PZO), although it functions as an independent facility.

We are located at Furkastrasse 7 in the heart of Brig’s historic old quarter, just a 5-minute walk away from Brig train station.

Here at the clinic, we offer a wide range of psychotherapies, using cutting-edge psychotherapeutic techniques. The therapy sessions are run on weekdays and our patients return home every afternoon rather than staying overnight with us.

Alongside our day therapy, where appropriate we are also able to offer additional outpatient treatment within the PZO or we can refer you to an external psychotherapist.

The adult day clinic

    • Our patients receive care in a familiar environment.
    • We are able to offer the same level of care provided by in-patient services, without the worry that sometimes comes with an in-patient hospital admission.
    • Having completed their treatment at the day clinic, our patients have the option to continue with psychotherapy through one-to-one sessions with their own outpatient psychotherapist, or with an outpatient psychotherapist from the PZO.
    • Our day clinic is located in lovely surroundings in the heart of Brig’s old town. It is easily accessible by public transport and the train station is only a 5-minute walk away.
    • We offer an initial consultation in which we will discuss the admission requirements with you. We can promise you that you will not have to wait long for an appointment. We will agree upon an admission date that works for you. We are usually able to admit patients to our day clinic relatively quickly.
  • The treatment we offer here in our psychotherapeutic day clinic takes a holistic view of the individual.

    With this approach, we look at the physical, psychological and social aspects of the patient, within the context of their own personal history.

    We work together with you to examine these different factors, in order to gain a deeper understanding of how your symptoms may have developed, what may be perpetuating your condition, and why previous treatments may not have worked well for you. This allows us to obtain important information about the best approach to take going forward.

    Psychotherapy is, by definition, also ‘relationship therapy’. The way we relate to ourselves and to others has a significant impact on our sense of wellbeing and our health. An important part of the treatment process is therefore to experience and reflect upon your relationship with yourself and other patients. Within the context of therapy, everything that happens on an interpersonal level can be a source of exploration.

    As well as giving us the important experience of community, it also allows us to look at how we resolve conflicts and gives us opportunities to try out new approaches. This is achieved by the therapist and patient working together in a trusting, therapeutic relationship, based on a humanistic view, with both parties treated as equals.

    Group work is a core aspect of our approach to treatment, whereby the group is viewed as a microcosm of the human relationships we experience in everyday life. All our patients are enrolled in a dedicated therapy group for the duration of their treatment, made up of the patients themselves and two dedicated therapists. This is an important psychotherapeutic space for practice, experimentation and development. Here, patients can learn, try out alternative ways of thinking and behaving, and undergo helpful new emotional experiences.

    The aim of our treatment is not only to alleviate symptoms, but also to help our patients to develop a holistic, psychotherapeutic understanding of their illness and to activate their potential for personal growth so that they can achieve a new, more stable inner balance.

  • We pride ourselves on the excellent quality of our treatment. We make our patients the focus of our psychotherapy work. In doing so, we aim to guarantee professional care and support, based on the latest findings and scientific research.

    We have various measures in place to ensure the quality of our work, including:

    • intensive professional communication and cooperation in the form of regular one-to-one discussions and weekly team meetings
    • weekly visits from senior consultants
    • diagnostic investigations using standardised questionnaires and structured interviews
    • external and internal supervisions
    • collegial intervision
    • reliable sharing of information with other psychotherapists and doctors also responsible for the patient’s care
    • evaluation of our therapy results (assessments prior to, during and after treatment)
    • in-house quality management.

    Our patients’ happiness is of the utmost importance to us, which is why we ask all our patients to provide feedback on their experience of the therapy process in the form of a standardised questionnaire.

  • Our team consists of experienced clinical and psychological therapists, as well as therapeutic nurses and occupational therapists with a variety of additional qualifications.

    Our entire approach is therefore made up of a range of complementary therapeutic techniques, which enables us to meet the individual requirements of each of our patients.

Treatment

As part of a pilot project, the adult day clinic has been providing a pioneering approach to treatment since May 2020 – and with great success.

Our patients receive a carefully devised psychotherapeutic complex treatment with an integrative, interdisciplinary and multi-modal approach. This includes one-to-one psychotherapy, group therapy, emotional regulation, social competence training, stress management and relaxation techniques, ergotherapy and work preparation, all under the close supervision of our specialist clinicians.

Our patients return to their own homes for evenings and weekends. The therapy sessions take place on weekdays until 4:00 p.m., with a few short breaks and one long lunch break.

  • What conditions do we treat?

    • Depression
    • Anxiety disorders (e.g. panic attacks and phobias)
    • Burnout and other stress and work-related conditions
    • Adjustment disorders
    • Personality disorders
    • Obsessive compulsive disorder
    • Psychosomatic disorders
    • Psychological trauma
    • Schizophrenia and bipolar disorders

    Our day clinic is unable to offer treatment to:

    • anyone in the initial stages of addiction recovery
    • anyone who poses an acute risk of harm to themselves or others
    • patients with acute psychosis
    • those with severe physical impairments
    • those with no fixed living arrangements
    • those unable to participate in group work
  • The aim of psychotherapy cannot be narrowed down to a single concept. First and foremost, it is about using psychotherapeutic tools and support in a holistic way to help patients work towards recovery. The crucial factor here is that the patients themselves must really want to engage in this process, and must be willing to change their outlook and take responsibility for their own behaviour with regard to their health.

    The fundamental aims of the treatment are as follows:

    • to alleviate symptoms and improve physical and mental balance
    • to develop awareness of the issues being experienced
    • to develop a holistic, psychosomatic understanding of your condition
    • to promote relational skills
    • to establish a deeper understanding of structural functions (‘mentalisation’)
    • to develop an understanding of the underlying conflicts within your subconscious (and thus the psychodynamic forces at work)
    • to activate resources
    • to ensure early detection of chronic and harmful behaviours
    • to lay the foundation and inspire motivation for outpatient psychotherapy

    As well as these standardised objectives, we will discuss your own individual objectives with you at the start of your treatment. We will also help you to come up with your own set of personal, achievable goals.

    Psychotherapeutic treatment takes time; we cannot force our innate human capacity for learning and adapting to go any faster than it wants to.

  • The duration of treatment depends primarily on your clinical presentation and is based on your treatment order. This can vary significantly from one individual to the next.

    However, most of our patients have an average total length of stay in the day clinic of around 10–12 weeks.

  • Our day therapy aims to help you make long-term improvements to your mental, spiritual, social and physical wellbeing.

    The general curative factors at play in psychotherapy are the therapeutic relationship, compassion and the empathetic understanding of the therapist.

    There are also other specific curative factors of this treatment. The therapy process encourages the patient to express their feelings, develop awareness of the self and others, and to regulate their own emotions. It also stimulates learning processes and facilitates creative experience. It aims to help patients to develop positive prospects for the future, in terms of both their personal and professional lives. It aims to help patients to reinforce and stabilise their relationships, and to develop positive personal values. It also facilitates the patient to experience a sense of togetherness and community. At the same time, it also improves body awareness and can help to reduce the prevalence of impaired physical functions.

    However, we would also like to advise you that psychotherapy can also have unwanted effects or side effects for the patient.

    In some cases, patients may experience an initial worsening of symptoms. Focusing more intensively on your own emotions can cause over-stimulation, for example, which may lead to certain physical reactions.

    In addition, you may experience phases of inflated self-esteem, but also phases of intense self-doubt and possibly even suicidal thoughts. In these and other cases, it is extremely important that you express your moods and thoughts to us so that we can help guide you through these difficult phases and, if necessary, take appropriate steps to provide you with adequate support. The day clinic always has a team of experts on hand who you are encouraged to speak to if you feel unsettled or have any concerns.

    There may also be additional ‘side effects’ in terms of behavioural changes and life decisions. This may result in changes to your previous way of life and the structure of your relationships, such as those with your family, partner and friends.

    We recommend that you discuss any potentially life-changing decisions within the therapy and use the space to look at them more closely. This may include decisions such as those relating to your partner or your career, as therapy will help you to give sufficient consideration to the potential scope of such changes. That said, you are responsible for your own actions during your time with us.

    Any other potential risks that may apply to your specific case will be discussed when you begin your treatment with us. Please feel free to contact us – we will be happy to answer any questions you may have.

     

  • Please give us a call if you are interested in the treatment we offer here at the day clinic. We would be happy to discuss the admission procedure with you.

    Even if you are uncertain about whether or not our day therapy would be right for you, you are still welcome to call or email us and we will happily provide you with any advice and assistance you may need.

    Phone: 027 604 3087

    If you would like to have an initial consultation with us, this can be arranged via a referral from:

    • your GP
    • an internal psychotherapist at PZO
    • a resident psychotherapist
    • any other clinical professional or psychosocial institution.

    Our referral form is available to download from here:

     

    Once we have received your referral. we will contact you within one week with a date for your first, non-binding consultation.

    In this initial consultation, we will discuss whether or not our treatment may be suitable for you or if perhaps a different approach may be more beneficial. Sometimes we find that outpatient psychotherapy or in-patient treatment is a more suitable next step.

    If we determine that there are indications for day clinic treatment, we will work with you to organise prompt admission to the clinic.

     

  • The costs are usually covered by basic health insurance.

     

Therapeutic procedures

Treatment here at the day clinic consists of a carefully devised combination of therapy modules. All our patients are involved in this multi-modal treatment setting. You will take part in the various psychotherapeutic modules as part of a set timetable that runs from Monday to Friday. Thanks to the varying approaches of our interdisciplinary team, this course of therapy offers you the opportunity to experience new ways of relating to yourself and others in a group setting.

The therapists hold regular team meetings and discuss each course of treatment. This gives them a holistic understanding of the individual progress and unique background of each patient, and therefore enables us to provide tailored therapeutic support throughout the treatment process that meets the needs of each individual patient.

Here you can view an example of a weekly timetable.

Each patient has two sessions per week of one-to-one therapy, consisting of one session with their dedicated therapist and one discussion with their personal mentor, alongside group and creative therapy. Patients meet with their therapy sub-group every other week

Opening hours and contact

Opening hours

Monday - Friday: 08:00 am to 05:00 pm

Tagesklinik für Erwachsene, Furkastrasse 7, 3900 Brig

Phone: 027 604 30 87  

E-mail: szo.pzo.tagesklinik(at)hopitalvs.ch

Please also use the contact form outside our opening hours. We will answer you as soon as possible!

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