Adult Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and Anxiety Treatment

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and related mental health issues can significantly affect your life. Some people with OCD, hoarding disorder, and anxiety disorders have tried many treatments. Often, they are unable to reduce their symptoms significantly.

UPMC Western Behavioral Health offers special treatment programs for adults with these mental health issues. We use a clinically proven treatment for OCD, hoarding, and anxiety in a virtual group setting.

Research has shown that this treatment can reduce anxiety, obsessions, and compulsions. It combines exposure and response prevention (ERP) – a type of cognitive behavioral therapy – and medicine.

If you are looking for information for children, please visit our Intensive Outpatient Program for Children With OCD.

Contact Us

Health care workers can refer people to our programs. Please call 412-246-5600, option 2, or use our online referral form at UPMC.com/iopphpreferral.

What Are Anxiety Disorders?

Anxiety disorders are a group of mental health issues. People with them feel excessive worry, fear, or nervousness.

Conditions we treat

• Agoraphobia — Extreme fear of leaving the house.
• Body dysmorphic disorder (BDD) — Ongoing shame or anxiety over perceived flaws in physical appearance.
• Body-focused repetitive behaviors (BFRBs) — Repetitive self-grooming, including nail biting, cheek biting, skin picking, and hair pulling.
• Emetophobia — A fear of vomiting.
• Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) — Feeling nervous all the time for no apparent reason.
• Hair-pulling disorder (trichotillomania) — Repeated urges to pull out hair from the scalp, eyebrows, or other body parts.
• Hoarding disorder — When it is very hard for someone to part with their things, often resulting in lots of clutter.
• Misophonia — When certain sounds trigger emotional or physiological responses.
• Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) — Ongoing, unwanted thoughts or repetitive behaviors.
• Panic disorder — Brief, very scary attacks of overwhelming anxiety.
• Skin picking disorder (excoriation) — Inability to stop picking or scratching at the skin.
• Social anxiety disorder/social phobia — Fearing situations in which they think they may be humiliated.
• Specific phobias — Feelings of intense, irrational fear of something that poses little or no danger.

What Services Do We Offer?

Our programs include:

• Hoarding group.
• OCD and Anxiety Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP).
• Perinatal OCD and Anxiety Intensive Outpatient Program (IOP).

Through these programs, people will learn:

• How to improve functioning and quality of life.
• Needed skills and guidance. The aim is to reduce how frequent, intense and severe their worries, obsessions, and compulsions are.
• Tools to help tolerate uncomfortable or intrusive thoughts. They build a greater ability to deal with anxiety-inducing situations.

The method used in these groups is clinically proven to reduce anxiety, obsessions, and compulsions. It combines exposure and response prevention (ERP) – a type of cognitive behavioral therapy – and medicine.

What is exposure and response prevention?

Extensive research supports the idea that intensive cognitive behavioral therapy, specifically ERP, is the most effective treatment for OCD and anxiety disorders.

ERP has also shown positive outcomes for symptoms common to perinatal OCD and anxiety. ERP involves systematically exposing someone to their fears. They then refrain from engaging in compulsions or rituals to reduce anxiety. Intensive therapy means having several sessions per week for several hours.

OCD and Anxiety IOP

Our OCD and Anxiety IOP includes three three-hour group sessions per week. People in the program also take part in weekly one-on-one therapy sessions with an expert therapist.

They also can meet with an expert OCD and anxiety psychiatrist every week. These sessions focus on the review and management of their medicines. This meeting ensures that they receive all-around care regularly.

Perinatal OCD and Anxiety IOP

The perinatal community includes birthing parents and their partners during pregnancy and after childbirth. During this time, any new parent may develop symptoms of anxiety or OCD.

Symptoms of perinatal OCD may include:

• Compulsive checking behaviors to ensure the baby's safety.
• Excessive cleaning behaviors driven by germ-related fears.  
• Intrusive thoughts related to harming the newborn.
• Intrusive worries about harm to the unborn baby, such as miscarriage or congenital disabilities. These worries can cause significant anxiety during pregnancy.
• Other concerns and behaviors that significantly interfere with daily life.

We welcome new mothers to bring their newborn babies to treatment.

Our Perinatal OCD & Anxiety IOP consists of three three-hour group sessions each week. People taking part in this IOP can take part in one-on-one therapy with an expert therapist each week.

People in the program will receive weekly medicine check-ins and management. Our IOP psychiatrists focus on treating OCD and anxiety disorders. We work to ensure the highest level of care for people in the IOP.

Hoarding Group

Our Adult Hoarding Group consists of two 90-minute virtual group sessions per week over 10 weeks. We offer one-on-one therapy to those needing extra support between group sessions. We can also help the people in the program manage their medicines.

What to expect from our programs

People who want to be in the program will have an initial evaluation. They will meet with an expert clinician to determine if the program suits their needs.

These entirely virtual programs require people in the program to access a webcam on a smartphone, tablet, or computer. Group members must attend every session. They'll also need to complete assigned homework between meetings.

Why Choose UPMC

There are very few IOPs dedicated to OCD in the United States. There are even fewer programs for perinatal OCD or anxiety disorders.

Our IOPs are available virtually, making them accessible throughout Pennsylvania. All treatments are provided by experts in working with people with OCD and anxiety.