Letter to Editor. Is it possible to support cognitive behavioral therapy, led remotely, by determining so-called therapeutic tasks?

In this letter to the Editor, the authors comment recent publications about the attempts to remote realizations of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) in the treatment of anxiety disorders in elderly. The distinguished clinical situation is a part of a wider problem that can be named as "global crisis of aging populations". The use of CBT in many geriatric clinical situations is very effective, however, such therapy is very time-consuming, what hamper its widespread utilizations in practice. The authors therefore propose to support this form of treatment by determining so-called 'therapeutic tasks'. They derive the rationale for the proposed method from the analysis of the acting elements of various, new forms of CBT in combination with the analysis of sources of psychological resistance (resilience) of those older people who are doing well. The essence of the method proposed by the authors is assigning tasks which facilitate to patients' remembering of their 'trajectory of life'. The patients are then much more aware of unresolved psychological conflicts. The next tasks aid the patients to search for solutions to such mental problems and create a balanced imagery of their lives.