Format: Live-online Lecturer Led Classes (Virtual-Classroom) via Zoom

Duration: 1 Evening Every Week 6pm to 9pm

Online Live Attendance: 30 Hours

Self-Directed Learning: 30 Hours

Total CPD Credits: 60 Credits

Assessment: Written Assignment +/- Viva Voca Assessment

Award: Accredited Professional Diploma

Course Accreditation:

- Professional Development Consortium

- Provider of Excellence

- CPD Standards Office

- Irish Counselling & Psychotherapy Association (ICPA)

Course Description

The Professional Diploma in Advanced Therapeutic Skills for Complex Clients is designed for experienced practitioners who work with individuals presenting with multiple, longstanding or high-risk difficulties. The course focuses on deepening your clinical thinking and broadening your skills so you can stay steady, effective and compassionate in the face of complexity, uncertainty and strong emotions.

You will explore the nature of “complexity” in clinical work, including chronic and co-occurring difficulties such as trauma, personality-related issues, self-harm and suicidality, addiction, eating difficulties, relational instability, and physical and mental health comorbidity. The programme examines how attachment histories, shame, dissociation, neurodiversity, and systemic factors like poverty, discrimination and marginalisation shape presentation and impact engagement with services.

A core focus of the course is on formulation-driven, integrative practice. You will learn to draw on and flexibly combine ideas from different therapeutic models, including psychodynamic, humanistic, cognitive-behavioural, trauma-focused, and relational approaches, in a way that is coherent and responsive to each client. Emphasis is placed on pacing, boundaries, risk assessment and management, working with ambivalence and rupture, and sustaining a collaborative alliance over time.

The programme also pays particular attention to therapist factors: countertransference, burnout, vicarious trauma, and the emotional impact of working with high levels of distress and risk. You will be supported to use supervision more effectively, to reflect on your own patterns in the work, and to develop sustainable practices that protect both you and your clients.

Teaching methods typically include lectures, case-based learning, live demonstrations, structured skills practice, reflective groups, and opportunities to bring your own anonymised material. This diploma is particularly suited to counsellors, psychotherapists, psychologists, social workers, mental health and social care professionals. By the end of the course, you will have a more nuanced clinical lens, a stronger and more flexible skillset, and increased confidence in working safely, creatively and ethically with complex clients and contexts.

Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this course, participants will be able to:

Critically conceptualise complex client presentations
Develop and articulate advanced case formulations that move beyond diagnosis, integrating developmental history, trauma, co-morbidities, relational patterns, and socio-cultural context.
Evaluate and enhance the therapeutic alliance with complex clients
Identify, assess, and respond effectively to alliance ruptures, transference–countertransference dynamics, and boundary challenges, to maintain a robust and collaborative therapeutic relationship.
Apply advanced trauma-informed approaches
Use phase-oriented models of treatment (stabilisation, processing, integration) to work safely and competently with clients presenting with complex trauma and dissociative phenomena.
Work effectively with personality-based difficulties
Distinguish key personality patterns (e.g., borderline, avoidant, narcissistic traits) and apply appropriate relational and technical strategies that are non-stigmatizing and grounded in contemporary theory.
Integrate interventions for co-morbid and overlapping presentations
Plan and deliver coherent interventions when clients present with combinations of trauma, mood and anxiety disorders, addiction, self-harm, and physical health issues, prioritising treatment goals collaboratively.
Conduct advanced risk assessment and safety planning
Undertake structured and nuanced assessments of suicide risk, self-harm, and risk to others; formulate risk in context; and co-create realistic, ethical, and clinically sound safety plans.
Implement evidence-informed emotion regulation and skills training
Select, adapt, and deliver skills (e.g., from DBT, ACT, CBT, CFT, somatic approaches) that support clients in managing affect dysregulation, distress, and interpersonal difficulties.
Incorporate systemic and relational perspectives into casework
Formulate and intervene with awareness of family, couple, and wider network dynamics; engage systems (where appropriate) and collaborate with other professionals to support client progress.
Use self-reflection and supervision to enhance clinical practice
Critically reflect on personal responses, biases, and limits when working with complex clients, and use supervision, consultation, and reflective tools to refine one’s therapeutic stance and decision-making.
Maintain professional resilience and ethical practice under pressure
Recognise indicators of vicarious trauma, compassion fatigue, and burnout; implement personal and organisational strategies to sustain wellbeing; and uphold ethical and legal responsibilities in complex, high-risk work.
Integrate multiple therapeutic models into a coherent practice framework
Synthesize learning from different modalities and approaches into a clear, personally congruent framework for working with complex clients, and articulate the rationales behind chosen interventions.
Present and evaluate complex clinical work systematically
Prepare and deliver structured case presentations, demonstrating clear formulation, intervention planning, outcome evaluation, and critical reflection on both process and outcome.

Course Outline

Week 1 – Foundations of Suicide Prevention

Lecture: History, epidemiology, global and local data
Workshop: Challenging myths and stigma
Readings: WHO Live Life Strategy, SAMHSA Suicide Prevention Toolkit
Assessment: Reflective journal on language and stigma (500 words)

Week 2 – The Psychology of Suicide

Lecture: Theoretical frameworks (Interpesonal Theory, IMV Model, Psychache)
Case study: Analyzing pathways from ideation to action
Workshop: Understanding lived experience narratives
Assessment: Short essay (1000 words) applying theory to case

Week 3 – Risk and Protective Factors

Lecture: Epidemiological risk profiling
Workshop: Creating biopsychosocial formulations
Assessment: Risk formulation exercise (graded practical)

Week 4 – Assessment and Crisis Recognition

Lecture: Tools and structured professional judgment
Practical Workshop: Conducting simulated suicide assessments
Guest Speaker: Clinical psychologist or crisis service professional
Assessment: Recorded role-play (pass/fail competency)

Week 5 – Intervention & Safety Planning

Lecture: Overview of intervention models
Workshop: Safety plan development in triads
Reading: Stanley & Brown (2012) Safety Planning Intervention
Assessment: Safety plan submission & rationale (750 words)

Week 6 – Working with Special Populations

Lecture: Culturally safe and inclusive approaches
Panel Discussion: Voices from diverse communities
Assessment: Group presentation – targeted prevention strategy

Week 7 – Ethics, Law, and Professional Practice

Lecture: Legal duties, documentation, and ethical dilemmas
Workshop: Scenario-based decision making
Assessment: Case-based legal/ethical analysis (1000 words)

Week 8 – Postvention and Recovery

Lecture: Bereavement care, trauma responses, organizational postvention
Workshop: Designing a postvention protocol
Assessment: Draft organizational postvention plan (graded)

Week 9 – Community & Systems Prevention

Lecture: Population-level approaches, national strategies
Workshop: Policy analysis and prevention campaign design
Assessment: Capstone project proposal

Week 10 – Integration, Reflection & Capstone

Lecture: Integration of learning and professional identity
Workshop: Supervision, resilience, and self-care strategies
Assessment

Professional Diploma in Advanced Therapeutic Skills for Complex Clients - (LIVE ONLINE)
60 CPD POINTS

Format, Description, Outcomes & Outline

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