Approach To Psychiatric Patient – Behavioral Medicine Practice Test

Exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence is required for PTSD. This trauma exposure is what anchors the diagnosis and can be direct experience, witnessing the event, learning that it happened to a close family member or friend, or repeated exposure to details of the event (as with some professionals). Without this kind of exposure, the PTSD criteria aren’t met, even if other symptoms are present. Others don’t fit as the defining feature. Recurrent pleasant daydreaming isn’t a PTSD pattern; PTSD involves intrusive, distressing memories rather than pleasant fantasies. Symptoms lasting less than one month point to acute stress disorder rather than PTSD. Thoughts about the traumatic event that are ego-syntonic would imply alignment with the self, whereas PTSD symptoms are typically distressing and ego-dystonic.