Discussion with Oleksandr Filts: Trauma, Digression, and Detoxification

Teaches at the Lviv National Medical University as the head of the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy. In 2005-2007, he was the president of the European Association of Psychotherapy. He is also the co-founder and president of the Ukrainian Umbrella Association of Psychotherapists. Since 2015 he has been a member of the Scientific Commission of the International Sigmund Freud Foundation, as well as an honorary professor of the Sigmund Freud University and the Hungarian Psychiatric Association. He is also the author of many scientific articles and chapters in monographs. Special interests include psychopathology, addiction theory and treatment, and more recently, issues of war trauma.

Psychoanalyst practicing in west Los Angeles. He specializes in treating childhood trauma, addiction, and anxiety/depression. His book, Circles Without a Center: Addiction, Accommodation and Vulnerability in Psychoanalysis was published in July 2022 by Routledge. He is the winner of several analytic writing awards, and has been published online at the Los Angeles Review of Books, Aeon/Psyche, Psychology Today, GoodTherapy.org, and the APA blog site. He has appeared numerous times in the journals Psychoanalysis, Self and Context, and Psychoanalytic Inquiry. His website is