Treatment of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in Adults

Publication Date: February 24, 2017
Last Updated: March 2, 2023

Recommendations

Psychotherapy

For adult patients with PTSD, the panel strongly recommends that clinicians offer one of the following psychotherapies/interventions (listed alphabetically):
  • cognitive behavioral therapy- (CBT)1
  • cognitive processing therapy (CPT)
  • cognitive therapy (CT)
  • prolonged exposure therapy (PE)
(Recommendation)
1 The RTI UNC review refers to this as CBT-mixed therapy. CBT-Mixed is a category that includes interventions using aspects of CBT that do not fit neatly into the other CBT categories. It will be referred to in the present document as CBT.
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For adult patients with PTSD, the panel suggests that clinicians offer one of the following psychotherapies/interventions (listed alphabetically):
  • brief eclectic psychotherapy (BEP)
  • eye movement desensitization and reprocessing therapy (EMDR)
  • narrative exposure therapy (NET).
(Conditional recommendation)
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For adult patients with PTSD, there is insufficient evidence to recommend for or against clinicians offering the following psychotherapies/interventions (listed alphabetically):
  • relaxation (RX)
  • Seeking Safety (SS).
(Insufficient evidence)
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Overview

Title

Treatment of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in Adults

Authoring Organizations