Lesson 1Assessing comorbidities common with personality disorders: mood, anxiety, PTSD, substance use, ADHD, and when to refer for neurocognitive testingLooks at common overlapping conditions with personality disorders like mood issues, anxiety, PTSD, substance use, and ADHD. Covers screening, telling them apart, treatment order, and when to send for brain function tests or specialists.
Screening for mood and anxiety disordersIdentifying PTSD and complex traumaSubstance use and addictive behaviorsRecognizing ADHD across the lifespanWhen to refer for neurocognitive testingTreatment sequencing with comorbidityLesson 2Assessing trauma and attachment patterns: using ACEs, childhood trauma questionnaires, and clinical interview techniquesGives ways to check trauma and attachment using ACEs, questionnaires, and interviews. Stresses going at the right pace, ensuring safety, checking for dissociation, and connecting past trauma to current personality.
Using ACEs and similar screening toolsChildhood trauma questionnaires in depthInterviewing for attachment experiencesAssessing dissociation and fragmentationPacing, safety, and stabilizationConnecting trauma to current patternsLesson 3Cultural formulation and differential baseline personality expression: cultural identity, explanatory models, and bias reduction in assessmentLooks at how culture affects personality and assessment, including identity, explanations, norms, and avoiding clinician bias. Offers strategies for cultural formulation, putting symptoms in context, and not labelling differences as illness.
Eliciting cultural identity and affiliationsExploring cultural explanatory modelsNorms for emotion, behavior, and selfDistinguishing culture from pathologyRecognizing and managing clinician biasUsing cultural formulation interviewsLesson 4Collateral history gathering: consent, sources, how to elicit reliable information from family, primary care, past therapistsCovers ethical and practical steps for getting history from others, including consent, choosing informants, asking right questions, and sorting differences to make personality assessment more reliable and less biased.
Obtaining and documenting informed consentSelecting appropriate collateral informantsStructuring collateral interviews for clarityManaging conflicting collateral informationAddressing confidentiality and privacy limitsLesson 5Comprehensive psychiatric history: developmental, trauma, attachment, education/employment, legal, substance use, treatment historyOutlines full psychiatric history for personality issues, covering development, trauma, attachment, schooling and work, legal matters, substances, past treatments, with focus on timeline and background.
Developmental milestones and temperamentFamily environment and attachment historyEducational and occupational trajectoryLegal, financial, and housing historySubstance use patterns and consequencesPrior treatments and response patternsLesson 6Functional assessment: occupational, social, interpersonal functioning, activities of daily living, risk triggersFocuses on checking real-life functioning in work, school, relationships, self-care, and risks. Links impairments to personality traits, spots triggers, and uses findings to decide care level and interventions.
Assessing occupational and academic rolesEvaluating social and intimate relationshipsActivities of daily living and self-careIdentifying risk triggers and patternsLinking traits to functional impairmentUsing functioning to guide treatmentLesson 7Documenting and synthesizing findings into a diagnostic formulation and problem listShows how to organise interview data into a clear diagnosis, link symptoms to traits, prioritise problems, and share findings with patients and teams for treatment and risk plans.
Organizing data by domains and timelinesLinking traits, symptoms, and stressorsDrafting a multiaxial style formulationPrioritizing and structuring the problem listCommunicating formulations to patientsUpdating formulations over timeLesson 8Structured diagnostic instruments: SCID-5-PD, SCID-5-CV, IPDE — administration, scoring, interpretationIntroduces main tools for diagnosing personality disorders like SCID-5-PD, SCID-5-CV, IPDE. Covers when to use, how to do them, score, interpret, and mix with clinical judgement.
Overview of major PD interview toolsIndications and contraindications for usePreparing patients and setting expectationsStandardized administration proceduresScoring, thresholds, and reliabilityIntegrating results with clinical judgmentLesson 9Mental status examination focused on personality features: affective lability, identity, cognition, empathy, reality testingExplains mental status exam focusing on personality, like mood swings, identity, thinking, empathy, reality check. Gives words for notes and diagnosis links.
Observing affective range and stabilityAssessing identity and self-conceptEvaluating thought content and styleAssessing empathy and perspective takingReality testing and micropsychotic signsDocumenting personality-relevant findings
