Defining Future Therapies: COSRT’s 50th Anniversary Conference

Fifty years ago, we created therapies. Today we define them. Together.

Conference: 10 December 2026

Online and In-Person

The organisation that would become COSRT was founded in 1976 by a small, multidisciplinary group of doctors, psychiatrists, marriage guidance counsellors, social workers and other practitioners working with sexual and relationship difficulties. From the beginning, its purpose was to support practitioners, advance specialist education and help ensure that Service Users received the best possible care. Relationship therapy, then commonly described as marital therapy, was central to this early work and remains reflected in the charity’s legal articles.

Over the following 50 years, this multidisciplinary collaboration helped develop Psychosexual and Relationship Therapy and Relationship Therapy as distinct but closely connected professions. Their development was supported by specialist training, ethical and professional standards, practitioner accreditation and growing evidence bases. COSRT subsequently developed dedicated public registers for both professions, with the Relationship Therapist register established more recently.

Today, COSRT represents and supports those closely connected professions as a uniquely specialised professional body. This anniversary conference will celebrate their shared history whilst examining how both must continue to evolve. Through keynote presentations, specialist contributions and multidisciplinary discussion, the programme will explore the knowledge, standards, evidence and partnerships needed for the future.

Further details and speakers will be announced as the programme develops.

Conference Programme

Session 1:

Opening Keynote: From Founding Professions to Defining Their Future

Keynote speaker and rapporteur: Professor (Dr) Divine Charura

The opening keynote will reflect on the social, cultural and clinical conditions that shaped the development of psychosexual therapy and relationship therapy as distinct but closely connected professions. It will consider how changing understandings of relationships, sexuality, identity, culture, race and intersectionality have reshaped both professions over the past 50 years.

The session will explore which values, principles and achievements should be preserved, alongside the assumptions, structures and practices that may need to be challenged or left behind. Drawing, where possible, on the views and experiences of COSRT members, it will invite a shared vision for what these professions should become over the next 50 years.

Session 2:

Specialist Therapy in Complex Systems and Pathways

Speaker: Dr. Angela Wright

This session will examine how practitioners can most effectively understand and respond to sexual and relationship concerns within wider clinical, psychological, relational and social contexts. Recognising the complexity of multidisciplinary systems and the benefits of integrated, person-centred care, it will explore formulation across five interconnected realms: biological, psychological, relational, socio-cultural and erotic.

Using menopause as one example of increasingly complex clinical presentations, we will consider the knowledge needed to recognise physical health concerns, understand the effects of medication and treatment, navigate clinical pathways and work effectively across professional boundaries. The session will also explore implications for future training and interdisciplinary practice.

Session 3:

Whose Knowledge Counts? Exploring Forty Plus Years of Sexual and Relationship Therapy: Implications for Evidence-Based PRT Practices

Speaker: Dr Markie Twist

Researchers play a vital role in shaping the evidence base of professions and supporting the development of evidence-informed practice. In this session, Dr Markie Twist will provide a brief history of COSRT’s journal, Sexual and Relationship Therapy: International Perspectives on Theory, Research and Practice, and explore common themes that have emerged across more than 40 years of publication, with particular attention to evidence-based practice.

The session will also examine gaps in research and the evidence underpinning practice, particularly in relation to people from minoritised backgrounds and those with underrepresented identities and experiences. This includes queer people, people whose cultural backgrounds sit outside dominant Western frameworks, and digisexual people.

The discussion will conclude by considering how researchers, practitioners, academics, service users and people with lived experience can contribute to an evidence base that is ethical, inclusive, robust and clinically useful, helping to strengthen the journal’s research well into the future.

Session 4:

Standards That Protect, Standards That Evolve

Speaker: Dr H. Eli Joubert

Professional standards provide essential frameworks for ethical practice, competence, accountability and public protection. At a time of significant discussion and change concerning professional standards and regulation, this session will examine how accreditation, supervision and professional accountability have shaped both professions.

The session will explore whether existing standards remain responsive to changing clinical, social and professional realities. It may consider emerging challenges such as online and cross-border practice, artificial intelligence, evolving routes into the professions, and the need to balance consistency and protection with accessibility, flexibility and innovation.

Session 5:

Two Professions in a Changing System: Boundaries, Pathways and Whole-Person Care

Speaker: Dr Leila Fordsham

Psychosexual and Relationship Therapy and Relationship Therapies have developed as distinct but closely connected professions. However, their future will be shaped not only by their relationship with one another, but by the increasingly complex health, care and professional systems in which practitioners work.

This session will explore how PRT and RT can retain clear professional identities while working effectively across NHS structures, referral and commissioning pathways, medical services and multidisciplinary teams. It will consider professional boundaries, specialist knowledge and the growing need for whole-person approaches that recognise the interaction between physical health, psychological wellbeing, relationships and sexuality.

The session will explore what practitioners need from future training, standards and professional structures and how COSRT can help both professions remain visible, credible and equipped to collaborate.

Session 6:

Closing Plenary: Defining the Future Together

The conference will conclude with an interactive plenary bringing together key themes from across the day. Designed to be collaborative and informative, the session will invite audience participation and create space for shared reflection, questions and discussion.

Further information about the plenary format and contributors will be released soon.

Keynote Speaker & Rapporteur:

Professor (Dr) Divine Charura  Professor of Counselling Psychology. Divine is a counselling psychologist, registered and licensed as a practitioner psychologist with the Health and Care Professions Council in England (UK).

Divine’s research interests are on the psychotraumatology and mental health in family and diverse community systems across the lifespan.

He has co-authored and edited numerous books. These include Love and Therapy: In relationship [co-edited with Stephen Paul] and with Professor Colin Lago co-edited Black Identities + White therapies: Race respect and diversity, (2021). His latest books are the Handbook of Social Justice in Psychological Therapies. Power, politics, change (co-edited with Dr Laura Winter in 2023) and Trauma Demystified (2024) (Co-edited with Dr Mark McFetridge and Dr Emma Bradshaw).

Speakers

Dr Angela Wright MBChB MRCGP DFSRH Dip. Pall Med DIPM Reg(COSRT)FECSM (Fellow of the European Committee of Sexual Medicine) is a GP, Clinical Sexologist, BMS Registered Menopause Specialist and COSRT-registered psychosexual therapist.

Angela is a GP, Clinical Sexologist, BMS Registered Menopause Specialist and COSRT-registered psychosexual therapist. She holds qualifications in medicine, sexual and reproductive health, palliative medicine and psychosexual medicine, alongside training in EMDR and somatic trauma therapy.

Her clinical work sits at the intersection of medicine, sexuality and therapy, with a particular interest in the relationship between the body and mind, and how our physical and hormonal health, psychological history, relationships and wider context shape sexual wellbeing. She is especially interested in the impact of trauma on the body, health and sexuality, and in developing genuinely integrated, whole-person approaches to sexual healthcare.

Dr Markie Twist, PhD is a sexuality educator, sexologist, relationship therapist, author and international speaker.

Markie Louise Christianson (L. C.) Twist, PhD, MA, MEd, BS, LMFT, LMHC, CSE-S, RegCOSRT (dr./she/they) was born in Alaxsxa (Alaska) and grew up in a small village on the road-system. Dr Markie is Teaching Faculty and the Graduate Student Research Chairperson in the Doctoral and Masters Couple and Family Therapy (CFT) programs, as well as the Sexuality Studies Certificate in the Relational Therapy Division at Antioch University (New England and Seattle campuses) in the Graduate School of Counseling, Therapy, and Psychology. Dr Markie is also the Session Instructor in the University of Guelph Professional Sexuality Practices Clinical Training Program in Guelph, Ontario, Canada.

Dr Markie is a registered member of the College of Sexual and Relationship Therapists (RegCOSRT), a licensed marriage and family therapist (IA, NV) and mental health counsellor (IA), as well as a clinical fellow and approved supervisor of the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy (AAMFT), and certified sexuality educator and supervisor through the American Association of Sexuality Educators, Counselors, and Therapists (AASECT).

Dr Markie is co-author of the books, The Internet Family: Technology in Couple and Family Relationships, The Couple and Family Technology Framework: Intimate Relationships in a Digital Age, and Focused Genograms: Attachment Focused Intergenerational Assessment of Individuals, Couples, and Families (2nd ed.).

Dr Markie serves as the Editor-in-Chief of Sexual and Relationship Therapy: International Perspectives on Theory, Research and Practice and is co-editor of the book, Eco-Informed Practice: Family Therapy in an Age of Ecological Peril.

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Dr H. Eli Joubert is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist, European Certified Psycho-Sexologist (ECPS), and specialist in gender healthcare.

Dr H. Eli Jouberthas held senior clinical, leadership and teaching appointments within the NHS and higher education, and works across psychosexual therapy, neurodiversity and gender-affirming care. His particular professional interest lies in the ethical dimensions of clinical practice, especially where sexuality, identity and complex decision-making intersect. An experienced educator and clinical supervisor, he has taught on doctoral psychology programmes, provided specialist training internationally, and regularly presents at professional conferences. He is a past trustee of the College of Sexual and Relationship Therapists (COSRT), currently a member of the Clinical Ethics Groups for both an NHS Trust and COSRT. He is committed to advancing ethical, evidence-informed practice through teaching, supervision and professional leadership.

Dr Leila Frodsham is a Consultant Gynaecologist and Psychosexual Medicine Lead at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust.

Leila Frodsham is a Consultant Gynaecologist and Psychosexual Medicine Lead at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust. She is a Menopause Specialist with the British Menopause Society and a core member of the GSTT endometriosis team, working across women’s health, psychosexual medicine, and complex pain conditions.

Leila is a long-standing Seminar Leader at the Institute of Psychosexual Medicine (IPM), where she has also served for more than 11 years on council in roles including Programme Secretary, Chair, and Media & Communications Officer. She also holds key educational positions at King’s College London as Women’s Health Block Co-Lead, Transition to F1 Lead, and Senior Educational Supervisor, and is a Foundation Training Programme Director within Postgraduate Medical Education.

She graduated in Medicine from Leicester University in 1995 and has worked across the Midlands, South East Coast, and London. Her research at Chelsea & Westminster Hospital explored assisted conception in HIV-positive women. Her specialist interests include sexual pain disorders, sex and endometriosis, sex and cancer, sex and menopause, tocophobia, and the psychosexual care of neurodivergent, LGBTQ, and global majority patients.