Why Dialogue Cures: In Conversation with Dr Jaako Seikkula

In this episode we speak with no other than Dr. Jaako Seikkula on this latest bookWhy Dialogue Does Cure: Explaining What Makes Dialogue Unprecedentedly Effective in Difficult Crises (2025). The book presents the core principles of Open Dialogue, a system of psychiatric care and dialogic psychotherapy that has spread to over 40 countries. Why Dialogue Does Cure explores the transformative power of Open Dialogue, a radically humanistic approach to mental health care developed in Western Lapland. This episode unpacks why dialogic practice—where clinicians, clients, families, and networks meet in shared conversation—can lead to recoveries unimaginable in conventional psychiatry.

Together we discuss the history, development and discovery of how Open Dialogue redefined care: not by aiming to eliminate symptoms, but by meeting the full human through transparent, team-based dialogue.

Dr. Seikkula argues that the widening gap between humanistic and conventional approaches must be bridged—and that dialogue itself can be curative. This episode is essential listening for psychotherapists, clinical psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, and anyone interested in meeting the full human in therapeutic practice.

Seikkula, J. (2025). Why dialogue does cure: explaining what makes dialogue unprecedentedly effective in difficult crises.