Diagnosing PTSD and Other Trauma Or Stressor Related Disorders
Most of Jennifer Sweeton’s teaching is about treatment. This one is not, and the reason is her other job. Alongside a private practice built on trauma and PTSD, she does a substantial amount of forensic work: capital murder cases, personal injury, racial discrimination, workers compensation, much of it for public defenders.
That work is what made her serious about diagnosis. In a clinical setting an imprecise diagnosis rarely gets tested. In a forensic setting it is examined by someone whose job is to take it apart, and the consequences of getting it wrong land on the client. She is clear that accuracy matters clinically too, but the forensic context is where the stakes are visible.
Three hours on the DSM-5’s trauma and stressor-related disorders, a category that did not exist before the fifth edition. Seven diagnoses were placed in it, gathered around a single idea: disorders that result from something happening to a person. She walks the category, separates the two that are most often confused, and spends a good part of the time on where the PTSD criteria themselves fall short, which is the part most clinicians will find useful. She also brings de-identified cases from her own practice where the diagnosis was genuinely difficult.
You’ll walk away with
- The seven diagnoses in the DSM-5 trauma and stressor-related disorders category, and the thinking behind grouping them
- Reactive attachment disorder and disinhibited social engagement disorder separated properly, including why one DSM-IV diagnosis became two and what they still share
- The limitations of the DSM-5 PTSD criteria, and what a clinician sees regularly that the criteria do not account for
- Where acute stress disorder ends and PTSD begins, and why the one-month line matters more than it looks
- Adjustment disorder and the two residual categories, and when each is the honest answer
- What misdiagnosis costs a client, clinically and in a legal setting
- De-identified case examples from her own practice, chosen because the diagnosis was hard rather than because it was clean
- A sense of what to think about before you commit to a diagnosis you may later have to defend
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CPD Information For Mental Health Professionals
Enjoy complete flexibility with 100% self-paced learning you can access anytime, anywhere, and on any device. This course is included with your Tatra Training membership, along with every other course in the library.
Course Duration: 3 learning hours
Certificate and CPD hours: On completion you’ll receive a Certificate of Completion to support your CPD records. Your certificates are yours to keep.
Assessment: Complete a short quiz at the end (80% pass mark), which you can resit as many times as needed.
Revisit Anytime: Come back to the course as often as you like while your membership is active, whenever you want a refresher for practice.
CPD Eligibility: This program may be suitable for CPD for professionals such as:
- Psychologists
- Counsellors and Psychotherapists
- Social Workers
- Community Workers
- Mental Health Nurses
- General Practitioners (GPs)
- Occupational Therapists
CPD requirements vary between professional bodies, so please check with your association or credentialing body to confirm you can claim CPD hours/OPD points for this program and what evidence they require.
This training will provide participants clinical knowledge and tools to:
a). Name all of the diagnoses in the DSM-5 disorder category, Trauma and Stressor-Related Disorders.
b). State one difference between Reactive Attachment Disorder and Disinhibited Social Engagement Disorder.
c). Identify challenges and limitations of the DSM-5 PTSD diagnosis.
d). Discuss the possible clinical and forensic implications of misdiagnosing traumatized individuals.
Target Audience:
The target audience for this event includes psychologists, social workers, counselors, MFT’s, and other clinical mental health professionals.
Course Content
Meet Your Instructor
Trauma survivors whose PTSD symptoms resist traditional therapy approaches - and clinicians struggling to understand how neuroscience can enhance treatment - may need more than generic trauma protocols to help create lasting healing. Jennifer Sweeton has spent her career bridging cutting-edge neuroscience research with practical clinical application, becoming an internationally recognised expert who has revolutionised how practitioners understand and treat trauma through brain-based interventions.
As a Stanford-educated clinical and forensic psychologist with doctoral training at Stanford University School of Medicine and a master's degree in affective neuroscience, Dr. Sweeton represents the pinnacle of scientific rigor applied to trauma treatment. Her Amazon #1 bestselling book Trauma Treatment Toolbox and recognition by Shortform as one of the "100 Best Trauma Books of All Time" demonstrate her ability to translate complex neuroscience into practical tools. Her recent completion of her JD from the University of Missouri-Kansas City adds crucial legal expertise to her forensic psychology practice, making her uniquely qualified for complex cases involving legal proceedings.
Dr. Sweeton's expertise spans PTSD treatment, the neuroscience of mental health, forensic assessment, women's issues, anxiety disorders, and legal aspects of mental health. Her approach integrates evidence-based trauma therapies with cutting-edge understanding of neuroplasticity and brain-based healing. She is the developer of Neural Desensitisation and Integration Training (NDIT), an evidence-informed modular psychotherapy for PTSD that specifically targets neuroplasticity in key brain regions. Her specialisation includes complex trauma presentations, forensic evaluations for legal proceedings, and cases where standard trauma treatments have been ineffective.
What sets her training apart is rigorous science combined with practical application. As a world-renowned trauma treatment expert, Sweeton doesn't just teach trauma techniques - she shows practitioners how specific interventions create measurable changes in brain structure and function. Her experience training over 60,000 mental health professionals worldwide demonstrates her exceptional ability to make neuroscience accessible to practicing clinicians.
For your practice, expect to gain brain-based trauma interventions, specific techniques for treatment-resistant PTSD, and forensic assessment skills for legal cases. Her approach particularly benefits clinicians wanting to integrate neuroscience into their trauma work, those dealing with complex forensic cases, or practitioners seeking advanced training in evidence-based PTSD treatment.
Quick Win: Sweeton's "neural pathway mapping" technique helps clients understand how trauma affects specific brain regions - helping to reduce shame and increase treatment engagement by showing that PTSD symptoms reflect brain changes, not personal weakness.
Qualifications
- PsyD, Clinical Psychology, PGSP-Stanford PsyD Consortium, 2012
- MS, Clinical Psychology, PGSP-Stanford PsyD Consortium, 2010
- MA, Personality Psychology (Affective Neuroscience), Stanford University, 2007
- BS, Cognitive Psychology, University of Kansas, 2004
- JD, University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Law, 2025
- Licensed Clinical & Forensic Psychologist
- Training: Stanford University School of Medicine, Pacific Graduate School of Psychology, National Center for PTSD
Authored Publications
- Traumatic Stress Recovery Workbook (2025)
- Trauma Treatment Toolbox (Amazon #1 bestseller, Shortform's "100 Best Trauma Books of All Time")
- Eight Key Brain Areas of Mental Health and Illness
- Train Your Brain Card Deck: 100 Techniques to Heal Trauma and Build Resiliency
- Multiple book chapters and professional publications
Leadership & Teaching
- Founder/Co-owner, Kansas City Mental Health Associates (group private practice)
- Former President, Greater Kansas City Psychological Association & Oklahoma Psychological Association
- Adjunct Faculty, University of Kansas School of Medicine & University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center
- Developer, Neural Desensitisation and Integration Training (NDIT) for PTSD
Professional Experience
- Director of Behavioral Health, Clinton Service Unit, Indian Health Service, 2015–2016
- Telemental Health Psychologist, Oklahoma City VA Medical Center, 2013–2015
- Combat Stress Recovery Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center/Oklahoma City VA, 2012–2013
Training & Speaking
- Trained over 60,000 mental health professionals internationally
- Keynote speaker, trainer, and workshop leader worldwide
- Sought-after expert for legal, corporate, government, and community education events
- Developer of continuing education programs serving 50,000+ licensed mental health providers
Ready to integrate cutting-edge neuroscience with trauma treatment? Discover how Dr. Sweeton's brain-based interventions can transform your ability to help trauma survivors achieve lasting recovery through evidence-based approaches that target specific neural pathways.
Feedback & Reviews
This course includes:
- Lessons 3
- Topics 0
- Duration 3 hours
- Quizzes 1
- Language English