Aetiology and Treatment of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

Essay from the year 2018 in the subject Psychology - Consulting, Therapy, grade: A, , course: Mental Health and Ageing, language: English, abstract: A wide range of both common events, such as traffic accidents, and extraordinary events, e.g. rape, can be traumatic. Although processing of traumatic events differs between individuals, it is very likely to be exposed to extreme stressors at some point in life which can lead to PTSD (54-64% in Europe and Japan) making PTSD a common disorder.

This essay will give an overview of the history of the term PTSD, PTSD-prevalence, and the DSM-V diagnosis for individuals older than 6 years. Moreover, aetiology (particularly social, environmental, psychological, and biological vulnerability-factors); and current treatments: Trauma-Focussed Cognitive-Behavioural-Therapy, Eye-Movement-Desensitization-and-Reprocessing, pharmacological/drug-assisted and alternative treatments will be discussed, considering recent psychological theories on PTSD by Foa and Kozak¿s (1986) Emotional-Processing-Theory and Ehlers and Clark¿s (2000) Cognitive Model of PTSD.