Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)

  • PTSD edition

    Trauma can occur in many forms from single exposure to a life-threatening or fear-inducing event, to sustained trauma ranging from neglect, other abuses, famine or war. All of which can present in clinical practice.

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  • Practitioner recommendations for PTSD: a 2018 update

    In 2018, Patrick Smith, Tim Dalgleish and Richard Meiser-Stedman compiled a Practitioner Review for the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and its treatment in children and adolescents. In their report, the researchers provide updates on the estimated rates of trauma exposure, and the incidence and course of PTSD in children.

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  • Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing improves PTSD symptoms in children

    Practice guidelines for childhood post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) recommend trauma-focused psychological therapies as the first-line treatment. The primary approach is trauma-focused cognitive behavioural therapies, which have a large evidence base.

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  • Trauma-focused group intervention is superior to usual care for young refugees

    Data from a randomised controlled trial show that trauma-focused group intervention delivered by trained social workers in addition to usual care (UC) is more effective in reducing post-traumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) in young refugees than UC alone.

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  • Early cognitive therapy for traumatised young people works and is also cost-effective

    More than half of children and adolescents will experience traumatic events like vehicle accidents, house fires, or violence.  However, brief counselling for young people in the immediate aftermath of an acute traumatic event has not be shown to be any more effective than not intervening and allowing natural recovery to take its course.

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  • Latest evidence on mental health interventions and service response to refugee children

    The latest figures indicate that in 2016 65.5 million people had to leave their homes due to war and armed conflicts, of which around one-third of are refugees who fled other countries to seek asylum.

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  • Parental responses in predicting children’s PTSD

    Many children will be exposed to a potentially traumatic situation at some point in their childhood -that is, an event where there is a potential threat to life or of serious injury to the child, or to someone close to them. These events can range from common unintentional or accidental traumas, such as car accidents or serious sporting accidents, to deliberate harm, such as assault or maltreatment. Such trauma exposure can have a significant negative impact on a child’s psychological wellbeing.

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  • Anxiety Edition – foreword by Dr Mark Lovell

    This edition of The Bridge covers the topic of anxiety. Owing to anxiety being common, with all of us experiencing a state of anxiety at some time and many also having trait anxiety, it is no surprise that ACAMH’s two main academic outputs the Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Child and Adolescent Mental Health contain some good quality research on anxiety advancing our knowledge of the science and evidence based practice.

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  • As a therapist, how should I grieve after a patient’s suicide?

    Social worker Beth lost her patient Toby to suicide, but didn’t feel entitled to process it as a personal loss. Why do we treat personal and professional grief differently, and how can we support professionals who suffer traumatic losses?

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  • ‘Service offer and access to local services’ Jenni Willbourn and Dr Kate Friedman

    Jenni Willbourn and Dr. Kate Friedman talk sharing follow-up of the excellent work ongoing in Greater Manchester following the traumatic Manchester Arena event. ACAMH members can now receive a CPD certificate for watching this recorded lecture.

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