Professional Diploma in Addiction Studies- Live Online CPD Accredited

Course Description:

This 10-week professional diploma offers a comprehensive, clinically relevant exploration of addiction designed for mental health professionals, psychotherapists, counsellors, and allied practitioners. Blending contemporary addiction studies with practical psychological insights, the course examines the biopsychosocial, developmental, and relational dimensions of addiction.

Participants will explore how trauma, attachment disruptions, emotional dysregulation, and behavioural conditioning contribute to the development and maintenance of addiction. The programme also introduces psychodynamic and psychoanalytic themes—such as unconscious processes, defence mechanisms, and transference—but within a broader integrative framework that includes cognitive, behavioural, and neurobiological models.

Through a combination of live online seminars, case-based discussions, and clinical application workshops, learners will develop practical skills in assessment, formulation, and intervention. Emphasis is placed on therapeutic engagement, building the working alliance, responding to resistance, and maintaining ethical boundaries in treatment.

Target Participants:

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This course is suitable for:

• Accredited and pre-accredited counsellors and psychotherapists

• Counselling & Psychotherapy Practitioners & Students

• Clinical psychologists, social workers, mental health nurses

• Addiction counsellors and key workers

• GP or allied health professionals working with substance use

• Trainees in counselling and psychotherapy (final-year students)

Course Outcomes:

 

By the end of this diploma, participants will be able to:

• Describe key theoretical models of addiction, including biological, psychological, and social contributors.

• Understand addiction as a complex adaptive response involving trauma, affect regulation, and attachment issues.

• Apply practical frameworks for assessment and case formulation in addiction treatment.

• Recognise signs of dependency, co-occurring mental health conditions, and high-risk behaviours.

• Employ effective therapeutic strategies in working with resistance, ambivalence, and relapse.

• Manage countertransference and boundary challenges with greater clinical awareness.

• Integrate ethical principles and best practice standards into addiction-related work.

Delivery Mode:

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• Format: Live Online (via Zoom)

• Schedule: 2 hours weekly over 10 weeks

• Total Hours: 40 CPD Points

• Includes: Live lectures, interactive case discussions, optional readings

• Assessment: Formative & Summative Assignment