This presentation will focus upon clinical and ethical issues related to complex dissociative disorders, To accomplish this, the workshop will provide an overview of the assessment and treatment of complex dissociative disorders (DD). Individuals with DD are a highly challenging population to treat due to their wide range of serious, chronic psychological symptoms, mistrust of treatment providers, and difficulties with managing safety. Their myriad symptoms can be misdiagnosed, leading to ineffective treatment. Furthermore, if assessors are not aware of recent research on psychological assessment of complex trauma, they may misclassify these individuals, particularly those with DD, as malingering. We will start with a presentation of a case of woman with DD who was misdiagnosed for decades, and whose trauma history went largely unrecognized and untreated despite her receiving mental health care throughout her life. We will then review signs, symptoms and testing data that can alert clinicians to the possibility of a DD. The controversies about DD will be briefly reviewed and critiqued in light of research, followed by expert recommendations about the interventions to be used at each stage of DD treatment. The results of a large international treatment outcome study will be presented to inform participants about cutting edge research with DD. Last, we will discuss potential clinical missteps that can occur when treating individuals with DD related to boundary difficulties, traumatic re-enactments, and professional burnout, and methods for ethically handling these clinical dilemmas. Small group discussions will be used to engage participants in discussing how to make ethical and evidence-based decisions when working with DD clients.

CEUs: 6 Hours