Hello Isaac,
I gained a lot of insight from your post this week, mainly on the treatment modalities for PTSD. Prolonged Exposure (PE) is psychotherapy for PTSD. It is one specific type of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. PE teaches you to gradually approach trauma-related memories, feelings, and situations that you have been avoiding since your trauma. By confronting these challenges, you can decrease your PTSD symptoms. Prolonged exposure is typically provided for about three months with weekly individual sessions, resulting in eight to 15 sessions. The original intervention protocol was described as nine to 12 sessions, every 90 minutes in length Sixty to 120-minute sessions are usually needed for the individual to engage in exposure and sufficiently process the experience (American Nurses Association, 2014).
Therapists begin with an overview of treatment and understanding of the patient’s past experiences. Therapists continue with psychoeducation and then will generally teach a breathing technique to manage anxiety. Generally, after the assessment and initial session, exposure begins. As this is very anxiety-provoking for most patients, the therapist works hard to ensure that the therapy relationship is perceived as a safe space for encountering very scary stimuli. PE works to modify the fear structure through exposure and habituation to the feared but relatively safe stimulus (Mouilso et al., 2016)
References
American Nurses Association. (2014). Psychiatric-mental health nursing: Scope and standards of practice (2nd ed.). Washington, DC: Author.
Mouilso, E. R., Tuerk, P. W., Schnurr, P. P., & Rauch, S. A. (2016). Addressing the gender gap: Prolonged exposure for PTSD in veterans. Psychological services, 13(3), 308