Medical Errors Update: DSM-5 Resources for Differential Diagnosis

Description: Decades of research suggest that misdiagnosis of mental disorders is a common medical error. For example, individuals with Borderline Personality Disorder are often misdiagnosed with Bipolar Disorder, and many children and adolescents are misdiagnosed with ADHD. Although many people who meet the diagnostic criteria for Major Depressive Disorder (MDD) are undiagnosed, as many as 60 % of people who are diagnosed with MDD do not meet criteria for the disorder! Bipolar II Disorder, Social Anxiety Disorder, specific phobias, PTSD, Generalized Anxiety Disorder, OCD, eating disorders, Intermittent Explosive Disorder, and Body Dysmorphic Disorder are often missed by clinicians. Why is that? We’re often trained in graduate school to with cookie-cutter, seamless case examples, but in the real world, clients often don't present with "textbook" presentations of symptoms that neatly fall into a particular disorder. Many symptoms of mental disorders are "overlapping," meaning that the same symptom may be listed under several disorders. With the limited time that clinicians often have, how do we quickly formulate an accurate diagnosis? Find out by attending this 2-hour medical errors update! We'll use real case examples to show you how to use differential diagnosis resources for overlapping symptoms.

CE Broker Tracking #: 20-799937

This is an event sponsored by FMHCA. This course is approved by the Florida Board of Clinical Social Work, Marriage and Family Therapy and Mental Health Counseling, LMHC, LMFT, LCSW – FMHCA CE Broker #: 50-748

Learning Objectives:

1. Define “overlapping symptoms.”

2. Apply a 6-step differential diagnosis process.

3. Use the DSM-5 Differential Diagnosis mobile app to formulate a diagnosis for case scenarios involving overlapping symptoms.

About the Presenter:

Aaron Norton is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor and Licensed Marriage and Family Therapy serving as Executive Director of the National Board of Forensic Evaluators, Adjunct Instructor at the University of South Florida, Southern Regional Director for the American Mental Health Counselors Association, and President of the Florida Mental Health Counselors Association. He has nearly 20 years of clinical experience at Integrity Counseling, Inc., was awarded Mental Health Counselor of the Year by the American Mental Health Counselors Association and Counselor Educator of the Year by the Florida Mental Health Counselors Association in 2016, Research of the Year by Florida Mental Health Counselors Association in 2020, and has been published in several social science journals and professional magazines in clinical mental health counseling.