Symptom retention after successful intensive trauma-focused treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Background: Evidence suggests that individuals undergoing successful treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) continue to experience PTSD symptoms.Objective: To determine the extent to which people continue to suffer from PTSD symptoms after intensive trauma-focused treatment and at six-month follow-up, despite no longer meeting diagnostic criteria for PTSD.Method: In total, 1015 individuals with PTSD participated in an eight-day intensive trauma-focused treatment programme combining psychoeducation, physical activity, prolonged exposure, and EMDR therapy. PTSD symptoms were assessed using the Clinician-Administered PTSD Scale for DSM-5 (CAPS-5) at baseline, post-treatment, and at six-months follow-up. Residual symptoms among those who no longer met PTSD diagnostic criteria were identified. Logistic regression analyses explored baseline predictors of the most persistent symptoms.Results: CAPS-5 total scores showed a significant reduction from pre- to post-treatment (d = 1.99) and remained improved at six-month follow-up (d = 1.48), despite a small to moderate increase in symptoms between post-treatment and follow-up (d = −0.38). Among those no longer meeting PTSD criteria post-treatment (75.8%) or at follow-up (63.2%), a substantial proportion (56.1% and 44.7% respectively) reported residual symptoms. The most frequently reported residual symptoms at six-months follow-up were negative beliefs (32.2%), negative feelings (28.7%), and intrusive memories (26.9%). The most persistent symptoms, based on odds ratios, were avoidance of thoughts or feelings (C1, OR = 0.03), intrusive memories (B1, OR = 0.04), and negative feelings (D4, OR = 0.05). Predictors of these residual symptoms included number of traumatic events, sexual trauma, suicidality, country of birth and receiving governmental income support.Conclusions: The results support growing awareness that, after seemingly successful trauma-focused treatment, a notable proportion of patients continue to suffer from specific PTSD symptoms. These findings underscore the importance of continued monitoring and tailored interventions targeting residual symptoms following treatment.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.005 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".