The treatment of borderline personality disorder

As early as 1681 a physician in England complained already in a letter abou t patients who were loving excessively,to hate intensely those same persons soon after without any obvious reason. In addition, they showed sudden out burts of rage, pain and similar emotions. This early description of typical borderline symptoms introduces the account of the development of the theor y of borderline disorder from its beginnings until today. Before this backg round the stand of diagnostics and the most important contemporary treatmen t concepts such as the psychodynamic, the behavioural and the client-center ed approaches are presented. Answers to the question,which the adequate the rapeutic setting could be for inpatient treatment concepts, are suggested. Present empirical studies confirm the efficacy of psychotherapy in borderli ne disorders. The small number of these studies shows, however, how difficu lt it is to make empirical research in this field. For the future of the ps ychotherapy of borderline disorders a further increase in personality disor ders and an increasing differentiation in the treatment forms and in the sp ecialization of therapeutic is predicted.