| Gail Steketee, Ph.D. |
Gail Steketee, PhD, Professor at the Boston University School of Social Work, has conducted a multiple research studies of OCD and its spectrum conditions, including body dysmorphic disorder and the nature and treatment of compulsive hoarding. |
With colleagues Randy Frost, PhD. and David Tolin, PhD., she holds two
NIMH-funded grants to study diagnostic and personality aspects of
compulsive hoarding, and test a specialized cognitive and behavioral
treatment for this syndrome.
Additional research interests include the study and treatment of
compulsive hoarding of animals under the auspices of the Hoarding of
Animals Research Consortium (HARC).She has published over 150
articles, chapters and books on OCD and related disorders. Her most
recent books are by Oxford University Press -- Compulsive Hoarding and
Acquiring: Therapist Guide and Workbook (Steketee & Frost) and Buried
in Treasures: Help for Compulsive Hoarding (Tolin, Frost & Steketee).
Her Faculty Profile at Boston University
Online video presentation she did about Compulsive Hoarding
Obsessive Compulsive Foundation Hoarding Website (co-editor)
New England Hoarding Consortium
Spring 2006 Newsletter
Spring 2007 Newsletter
Chapter 23
News Article: The Boston Globe 4/2/07
"Buried Alive"
Quote:
"Pathological hoarding is far more than mere messiness or a pack-rat
tendency," said hoarding specialist Gail Steketee, interim dean of the
Boston University School of Social Work. The people she and her
colleagues treat and study tend to have reached the point where they
lose whole rooms to piles of what to them are treasures and to anyone
else looks like trash.
"Their homes are often tagged as potential threats to public health. Yet
otherwise, most tend to function fairly normally out in the world," said
Steketee, who has coauthored a new book, "Buried in Treasures," that
translates the therapy program for the lay public. "They may have some
depression, some anxiety," she said, "but mostly they're attached to
their things in ways that make it very difficult to get rid of them.
But it may well be that hoarding is actually closer to an "impulse control
disorder," like gambling, because those who hoard often experience
active pleasure as they acquire or pile up their possessions," Steketee
said. "Hoarding can involve emotions -- feeling safer among walls of
clutter, for example. And thoughts -- like, "I'm sure I could use that
broken tape deck someday!" And even unconscious values, like "More is
better."
Initial studies suggest that antidepressants offer little help for hoarding.
"More research has yet to be done trying other types of drugs,"
Steketee said. The treatment she has developed with her colleague,
Randy O. Frost of Smith College, attacks hoarding from several
directions. It fosters skills at decision-making, sorting, and organizing
and provides plenty of supervised practice at decluttering so hoarders
can keep at it on their own after therapy ends. It also tries to address
the deep-seated emotions that make it so hard to let go of things.
About half of the their clients have gotten significantly better, Steketee
said, rising from perhaps a 7 to a 3 on a photo test to determine their
level of clutter, from pure neatness (1) to total chaos (9). That is not bad
for a notoriously difficult problem, said Elias of McLean, who is not
involved in Steketee's research. Hoarding is one of the most recalcitrant
symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder.
| "They may have some depression, some anxiety," she said, "but mostly they're attached to their things in ways that make it very difficult to get rid of them. But it may well be that hoarding is actually closer to an "impulse control disorder," like gambling, because those who hoard often experience active pleasure as they acquire or pile up their possessions," Steketee said. "Hoarding can involve emotions -- feeling safer among walls of clutter, for example. And thoughts -- like, "I'm sure I could use that broken tape deck someday!" And even unconscious values, like "More is better." -Gail Steketee, Ph.D. Source |
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