Course overview

Elevate your practice and become equipped to provide psychological services to those who require specialised trauma care. The Postgraduate Diploma Practitioner in Complex Trauma has been established to support professionals working clinically with adults affected by prolonged or significant exposure to trauma and adversity. You will develop professional competences to provide psychological services to those who require specialised trauma care.

This course has been developed in partnership with The University of Buckingham.

Complex PTSD is a novel diagnosis, although traumatology has long acknowledged the spectrum of complexities in trauma related needs. Yet, current psychological assessment and treatment approaches often fail to differentiate between varying levels of complexity, in the context of limited evidence relating to the efficacy of treatments for complex trauma, specifically. As an emerging field, with a limited, and growing, evidence base, this can create challenges for clinicians wanting to ensure their service users have access to the latest evidence-based models and approaches to treatment.

This course has been developed in recognition that individuals with more complex and enduring needs require nuanced approaches to conceptualising service models and treatments.

• It adopts a holistic approach to the needs of people who have been exposed to prolonged or significant incidents of adversity or trauma
• The structure and content of the PGDiP follows the level three ‘trauma expert’ competencies outlined by the British Psychological Society (Karatzias & Buxton, 2016)
• The PGDip operates within a framework of emphasising the idiosyncratic care needs of service users to provide specialist complex trauma care
• It provides students with the opportunity to develop trauma-sensitive practice within their organisations and team
• There is also a strong emphasis on theory-driven and integrated approaches, and from working from the evidence base, including acknowledging, and working with their limitations

Emphasis is placed on strengthening core skills of self-awareness, including of awareness of one’s own professional and academic needs, as well as promoting self-care and accessing appropriate supervision.