Missed opportunity to rectify or withdraw a flawed metaanalysis of longer-term psychodynamic psychotherapy (letter(

We eagerly anticipated the response by Leichsenring and Rabung to our sweeping critique of their 2008 metaanalysis in which they claimed longer-term psychodynamic psychotherapy (LTPP) was more effective than shorter-term psychotherapies. Yet, we were disappointed that Leichsenring and Rabung, like Ehrenthal and Grande, dealt with so little of the specifics of our critique. Much of the substance of the response by Leichsenring and Rabung refers to an unfinished manuscript and another, still undergoing review in some unnamed journal, limiting the opportunity for independent evaluation by anyone open-minded but skeptical about each of our perspectives. The crux of our critique was statistical and technical because it is in these areas that serious flaws in their metaanalysis initially occurred, undermining any of their substantive interpretations. Perhaps our readers were as confused as Leichsenring and Rabung seemingly were, and thus we will use the 1,000 words allotted to us to briefly summarize our critique in substantive terms