An Overview of CBIT: Comprehensive Behavioural Intervention for Tics
What is CBIT (Comprehensive Behavioural Intervention for Tics)?Â
CBIT is a form of therapy that follows multiple frameworks, all targeting tic reduction: behavioural therapy, habit reversal, self-awareness training, relaxation training, social supports, tic analysis, and a few others depending on the practioner.Â
Does CBIT involve medication?
No, but it can be used in conjuction with medications used to treat tics. Ideally, a patient will be able to wean off tic medications as their CBIT skills and practice increases.Â
Tic Analysis - a process in which a client makes a hierarchy of their most bothersome tics, to their least bothersome tics. The therapist will then help them break down each using self-awareness training.Â
Self-awareness Training- this teaches the client to learn what premonitory urges (the sensation often felt before a tic) or triggers they experience before a tic happens. Recognition of premonitory urges and triggers allows for the next step;Â
Competing Response- once a client is aware of their premonitory urges/triggers, the therapist can then instruct them to apply a competing response. For example, someone with a finger snapping tic can learn to identify how they feel just before they tic and instead flex their fingers or sit on them (a competing repsonse, not surpression) before the tic can come out.Â
CBIT interrupts the premonitory urge cycle that prepetuates tics; premonitory urge -> tics -> tic relief. The competing response rewires the brain from expecting the tic relief response. And beyond that, it adresses the behavioural, emotional, and social aspects of tic disorders that often go ignored, allowing the client full occupational (life activity) fulfillment.Â