Post-traumatic stress disorder and Histrionic personality disorder

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Post-traumatic stress disorder and Histrionic personality disorder
Student’s Name
University

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Post-traumatic stress disorder
This is a mental disorder that develops when one is exposed to traumatic event in their
life. The issues that causes the stress are related to sex, assault, warfare, collision or anything else
that threatens their life (Amoroso & Workman, 2016). This often leads to disturbing thoughts
that the individual experiences that last for different periods of time depending on the effect.
Issue Description
Early descriptions of the concepts are linked to warfare where accounts of stress in
soldiers after the battle are used to describe a range of anxiety symptoms that they experienced
during war. This led to the conceptual frameworks that seek to understand the effects of stress as
a factor of mental illness development (Kilpatrick, et al., 2013). This conceptual framework led
to the understanding that there is a psychiatric syndrome that occurs as a consequence of being
exposed to stress. This led to the development of the field to advances in neuroscience that allow
stress scrutiny through brain neuroimaging. These events are categorized as being outside the
range of usual human experience which is different from human stressors.
The difference between trauma and normal stressors is that the human body system is
biologically designed to deal with stressors that fall within the ordinary category but traumas
present experiences that overwhelm the individual thus making them develop post-traumatic
stress disorders (Maercker & Perkonigg, 2013). This means that people only exhibit PTSD
characteristics when they have met the stressors that make the individual to suffer memory lapses
of what happened.
Latest Research Findings Summary
Researchers have attempted to categorize different levels of PTSD in patients as a way of
determining how they can understand the signs and symptoms that people with the condition

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display (Raskind, et al., 2013). Since people face different traumatic situations and their body
systems react differently the following criterion have been developed by researchers for
understanding people with the condition.
There are different criterion for diagnosing PTSD in patients. The first one is the stressor
criterion that focusses on the exposure of the individual to catastrophic events that threatens or
harms the individual. Once the individual has been exposed to the conditions, the disorder as
seen as a reaction to the experience that they have in the situation.
The intrusive recollection criterion deals with symptoms that are easily distinctive and
identifiable. The events can remain in the life of the individual for a certain period thus evoking
panic or psychological experience of the individual in case they are exposed to the condition
(Bass, et al., 2013). When the individual faces the images of the experience during the day, they
relapse back to trauma at night mostly when they are sleeping. This criterion is used in
reproducing the symptoms for laboratory tests during research by exposing the individual to the
condition.
The avoidance criteria is based on strategies used by PTSD patients to reduce their
exposure through behavioral strategies that reduce their exposure to traumatic stimuli. These
strategies are also used in reacting to situations or dealing with situations that create the rise of
the trauma.
The negative cognition and mood criterion reflects the alteration in beliefs and mood that
people develop after exposure to trauma. This is described as erroneous cognition about the
causes and consequences of the event thus blaming themselves for what they feel about the
situation. This is characterized by dissociative psychogenic amnesia that leads to cutting off the
conspicuous experience that one feels.

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Lastly, there is the alteration in arousal or reactivity criterion which resembles panic and
anxiety disorders (Panagioti, Gooding, Triantafyllou, & Tarrier, 2015). The individual suffers
intense trauma that appears like frank paranoia. This experience leads to unique neurobiological
substrate defined as the most pathognomonic PTSD symptom which makes the individual to
experience angry outbursts, aggressive behavior, recklessness and even self-destructive behavior
that is a result of the inability of the individual to manage the condition.
Signs to watch
Avoidance seen in avoiding people, places or situations that remind the individual.
Hyperarousal
Negative thoughts and beliefs.
Mood swings.
Behavioral changes.
Memory problems.
Lack of concentration on tasks.
Poor relationship with coworkers.
Absenteeism.
Unreasonable reactions to situations that trigger memories.
Response Plan: Remember you are not treating the condition
Haagen, Smid, Knipscheer, & Kleber (2015) suggests that the first approach in managing
people with PTSD at work is maintaining dialogue. By keeping lines of communication open, the
victim can benefit from empathic listening since they feel embarrassed about the experiences and
some blame themselves for what happened. In most cases such people are not easy to open up