Full Course Description
Top Tips for Optimizing Treatment for Military Service Members and Veterans
When you're working in psychotherapy with military service members and veterans, you'll want to speak their language.
And although the lingo itself is important, what's key is to adopt a communication style that conveys that you have your client's back – that you're dependable and trustworthy, and that you care about what's important to them.
In this session, Dr. Kathleen Chard – renowned military and veteran mental health expert and co-developer of Cognitive Processing Therapy – will share crucial strategies to enhance treatment effectiveness. You'll get:
- Guidance for shared decision making that empowers clients to engage in recovery-oriented care
- Strategies that enhance the therapy alliance and keep sessions focused on goals
- Tools for bolstering social support, a widely recognized protective factor for psychological well-being
Program Information
Objectives
- Utilize shared decision making in treatment planning for military service members and veterans that is informed by the VA/DoD treatment guidelines for mental health conditions.
- Evaluate the need for a preparatory phase prior to engagement in trauma processing.
- Plan at least two interventions that are focused on increasing social support for military service members and veterans.
Outline
Tip 1: Establish credibility by providing education about treatment guidelines
- VA/DoD treatment guidelines for mental health issues
- National Center for PTSD Shared Decision Making Tool
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Tip 2: Build trust by clarifying, collaborating, and getting right to work
- Clarify role of the therapist and responsibilities of the client
- Collaboration around treatment goals, methods, and length
- Moving quickly to treatment enhances alliance
Tip 3: Understand military bonds and strengthen connection
- The importance of understanding military culture
- Role of social support in trauma recovery
- Involvement of family and friends in treatment
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage and Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Other Mental Health Professionals
Copyright :
11/05/2026
Military Culture
They’re not all “soldiers” – servicemembers of each branch go by different names.
But awareness of military culture goes far beyond understanding the nuances of Army v. Navy.
It requires a deep understanding of how identity and values shift with service… how emotions and the nervous system are uniquely regulated in a high-stakes environment… and how relational patterns change when there’s a battle-buddy bond.
In this session, Jennifer Sluga – complex trauma and military mental health specialist – will show you how to understand military culture through a new lens that goes beyond basic education in branches and deployment. You’ll learn:
- How to talk with clients about the impact of military culture on identity development
- Attachment-based strategies to support clients with relational distress
- Somatic techniques to regulate the nervous system and cultivate emotional balance
Program Information
Objectives
- Examine the impact of military culture on identity development.
- Formulate a parts theory-informed case conceptualization to address identity fragmentation in military-connected clients.
- Identify at least three attachment-related factors associated with military culture and transition stress.
- Utilize at least two interventions focused on nervous system stabilization in military-connected clients.
Outline
Impact of Military Culture on Identity
- Branches, ranks, and context
- Unit cohesion, belonging, and identity formation
- Military cultural expectations
- Civilian vs military relational systems
- The importance of constant readiness and collective vigilance
- Parts conceptualization and attachment rewiring
- Transition stress – loss of community, identity, and meaning
- Nervous system perspective – high physical danger but high emotional safety
- War memories as adaptive – AIP model
Clinical Considerations
- Strengthen trauma-informed therapeutic alliance
- Identify diversity and intersectional considerations impacting reintegration
- Reframe military adaptations as strengths
- Treatment sequencing considerations
- Somatic stabilization, co-regulation, and bottom-up interventions
- Resource installation
- Targets for processing – transitions and losses
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage and Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Other Mental Health Professionals
Copyright :
11/05/2026
Moral Injury and Domestic Deployments
It’s not quite what they signed up for.
When U.S. service members are deployed domestically – such as for operations in major urban areas or along the border – they find themselves in the middle of politically and morally complex situations.
Duty, personal values, and public scrutiny collide -
Creating guilt, anger, confusion, and internal conflict that’s different from other stress and trauma responses.
In this session, Dr. Wyatt Evans – expert in moral injury and primary author of The Moral Injury Workbook - will give you a unique ACT-based skillset you need to work with moral pain and injury. You’ll learn:
- Tools to recognize moral distress so you can reduce this profound and debilitating form of suffering
- Structured, evidence-informed interventions that address moral conflict and values dissonance
- Strategies that promote psychological flexibility and adaptive meaning-making
Program Information
Objectives
- Define the unique operational and psychological contexts of U.S.-based domestic deployments and how they may contribute to moral distress among service members.
- Identify common clinical presentations associated with moral pain and moral injury in service members and veterans following dilemmatic domestic deployments.
- Utilize evidence-informed strategies to assess and address moral conflict, values dissonance, and meaning-making in clinical work with affected service members and veterans.
Outline
Domestic Deployments, Moral Pain, and Moral Injury
- Unique stressors of recent U.S.-based military missions
- Understanding moral pain and moral injury
- Conflict between duty, personal values, and public scrutiny
Assessment and Intervention
- ACT for moral injury
- Common clinical presentations
- How to identify and discuss moral conflict
- Mindfulness as a practice to prevent suffering amid moral pain
- Clarify core values to orient restorative action
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage and Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Other Mental Health Professionals
Copyright :
11/05/2026
Military Trauma
From institutional betrayal to betrayal of one’s own moral code, the trauma experienced by military service members and veterans has extra layers.
And to provide effective treatment, you can’t leave this important context out.
In this session, Dr. Daphne Fatter – international trainer in integrative trauma-informed therapies and former Military Sexual Trauma coordinator in the VA healthcare system – will give you a roadmap for case conceptualization and treatment of military service members and veterans who have experienced trauma from combat, sexual harassment and assault, and exposure to life-limiting health conditions. You’ll learn:
- Case conceptualization skills grounded in military culture to build an effective working alliance
- Transdiagnostic coping techniques to decrease acute distress and support stabilization
- Decision-making tools complex issues like which trauma to target first
Program Information
Objectives
- Define military-specific traumas and their impact on treatment planning.
- Develop a trauma-informed case conceptualization including culturally relevant factors to the military and veteran population.
- Evaluate the influence of betrayal experiences on military service members’ and veterans’ trauma-related symptoms.
Outline
Military-Specific Traumas
- Overview: combat, military sexual trauma (MST), medical/health traumas
- Betrayal and systemic trauma
- What clinicians need to know about moral injury
- Continuum of traumatic stress exposure
Assessment and Treatment of Military-Specific Trauma
- Importance of documentation for disability benefits
- PTSD assessment tools
- Strategies for case conceptualization
- Transdiagnostic coping skills – grounding, relaxation, mindfulness, and more
- Evidence-based treatments with the most support for PTSD
- Treatment decision-making factors
- Case studies
Additional Clinical Considerations
- Impact of pre-military trauma
- Clinical indicators of which trauma to focus on first
- Evaluating suicide risk during treatment
- Comorbid conditions – TBI, substance use disorders, grief, and pain
- Intersectionality and working with marginalized populations
- Vicarious trauma among mental health providers
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage and Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Other Mental Health Professionals
Copyright :
11/05/2026
Posttraumatic Growth for Military and Veteran Clients
Of course, by its very definition, trauma is devastating –
And there are ways for survivors to change for the better as a result of it.
Unfortunately, few therapists receive training in posttraumatic growth, leaving them focused on symptom reduction rather than prepared to help their clients activate the capacity for growth after adversity.
In this session, Dr. Taryn C. Greene – U.S. Air Force veteran and health psychologist at Boulder Crest Institute for Posttraumatic Growth – will show you what you need to know about posttraumatic growth so your military and veteran clients can learn to use their difficult life experiences as a means to live a more rewarding and fulfilling life. You’ll learn:
- A framework for posttraumatic growth that inspires clients to write the next chapter of their lives
- How to conceptualize the challenge to core beliefs that your clients are struggling with
- Strategies to offer “expert companionship” to your clients to increase connection and hope
Program Information
Objectives
- Define posttraumatic growth and its relevance for clinical practice.
- Integrate the posttraumatic growth model into treatment with military and veteran clients.
- Identify the five phases of expert companionship.
Outline
Posttraumatic Growth in Military and Veteran Clients
- Trauma as motivating a powerful shift in core beliefs
- Overview of the posttraumatic growth process
- Military culture factors influencing posttraumatic growth
- Differentiate from resilience
- Five domains of posttraumatic growth
- Case studies
Treatment Considerations
- How to integrate posttraumatic growth into treatment
- Assessment tools
- Expert companionship – psychoeducation, emotion regulation, disclosure/exposure, narrative, service
- Therapist as expert companion
- Help clients find expert companions in their lives
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage and Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Other Mental Health Professionals
Copyright :
11/06/2026
Transition Stress
Getting out of the military is as big a deal as going in.
It’s total culture shock as veterans face the reality of figuring out how to move forward in the absence of close comradeship, orders that structured each day, and purpose that felt larger than their own lives.
Adjustment challenges are the norm, not the exception.
And therapists working with veterans have to be ready to navigate unique challenges, supporting clients through issues as diverse as finding work that leans on their skills, making up for lost time with their families, and having difficulty relating to civilians.
In this session, Dr. Lillian Gibson – highly recommended speaker, consultant, and clinician with expertise in the treatment of trauma and transition stress – will give you a framework for the assessment and treatment of adjustment-related stress. You’ll learn:
- How to evaluate mental health symptoms common during the transition from military service
- Top strategies to normalize clients’ adjustment experiences – without making them feel dismissed
- Evidence-based interventions from IPT and MI to help clients create change in areas of struggle
Program Information
Objectives
- Identify psychosocial challenges Veterans face when acclimating to civilian life.
- Evaluate mental health symptoms associated with life transitions for veteran clients.
- Utilize at least one evidence-based strategy to decrease transition-related stress in veteran clients.
Outline
Military Separation & Mental Health
- Identity concerns among active duty-to-veteran populations
- Readjustment to familial and societal roles & expectations
- Signs and symptoms of acclimation challenges
- Impact of medical, physical, and/or psychological disabilities
Assessment & Treatment Planning for Transition Stress
- The importance of trauma-informed care
- Cultural considerations and cultural humility
- Common adjustment-related mental health symptoms
- The impact of comorbid conditions on overall functioning
- Top tips for normalizing clients’ experiences
- Interpersonal formulation from IPT to guide focus
- Clarify role transitions and disputes with the interpersonal incident technique
- Motivational Interviewing to create change in areas of distress and conflict
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage and Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Other Mental Health Professionals
Copyright :
11/06/2026
The Psychological Impact of Military Discharge
A new phase of life begins after separation from military service –
And the terms of that separation have an echoing impact on the adjustment of military-connected clients.
Without awareness of the ways in which medical, administrative, and policy-driven discharges can shape mental health and treatment engagement, therapists run the risk of minimizing the impact of this important transition on their clients.
In this session, Dr. Michael Gatson – expert in military mental health – will show you how military discharge is more a major psychological transition than a formal ending. You’ll learn:
- Targeted clinical questions to assess the impact of discharge on your clients’ well-being
- Trust-building strategies for concerns about documentation, employment, or security clearance
- A culturally responsive, trauma-informed framework to reduce stigma
Program Information
Objectives
- Describe the psychological impact of different types of military discharge.
- Identify how stigma and documentation concerns affect help-seeking and treatment engagement.
- Develop psychoeducation for clients about transition-related stressors.
Outline
Military Discharge as a Psychological Transition
- Loss of role, identity, and structure
- Planned vs. unplanned separations
- Discharge types and their impact
- Common emotional and identity responses
- Discharge-related stigma
- Impact of documentation concerns on disclosure and engagement
Discharge-Informed Treatment Strategies
- Engagement strategies tailored to self-reliant populations
- Assess identity, trust in systems, and stigma
- Targeted clinical questions to assess discharge impact
- Explore the relationship between discharge type and help-seeking behavior
- Connect presenting concerns to transition-related stressors
- Importance of being trauma-informed and culturally-responsive
- How to frame treatment in a strengths-based, mission-aligned way
- Pacing and normalization to avoid retraumatization
- Psychoeducation linking identity disruption to emotional responses
- Trust-building strategies for concerns about documentation, employment, or clearance
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage and Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Other Mental Health Professionals
Copyright :
11/06/2026
Military and Veteran Families:
You’ve gotten training on how to work effectively with military service members and veterans –
But what about the family members who are impacted by their experience? For every service member or veteran, there are as many as 12 loved ones whose well-being is interrelated.
In this session, Dr. James A. Martin – retired Army Colonel whose nearly sixty-year combined military and academic careers have brought public attention to the needs of military-connected families – will give you the tools you need for culturally competent treatment. You’ll learn:
- How to ensure that the impact of critical military experiences isn't missed or overlooked
- Best practices to engage military-connected family members that support system well-being
- Strategies to reduce barriers to critical services and important benefits
Program Information
Objectives
- Evaluate the relationship of military service members’ and veterans’ well-being with that of their loved ones.
- Integrate questions about military service into assessment of psychotherapy clients.
- Utilize at least two strategies to engage military-connected family members in treatment or with benefits.
Outline
Military-Connected Family Members
- Impact of military service basics
- Interrelationship of family members’ and service members’/veterans’ experiences and well-being
- The importance of military-connected family awareness for cultural competence
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Practical Strategies for Clinicians
- Assessment of military connection for every client
- Increase understanding of direct and indirect effects of service experiences, including deployments
- Useful client discussion prompts
- Strategies to reduce barriers to critical services and important benefits
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage and Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Other Mental Health Professionals
Copyright :
11/06/2026
Ethical Competencies for Mental Health Professionals Working with Military and Veteran Clients
Your own military service history and that of your family. Your political affiliation and beliefs about war. Your awareness of hierarchical systems, veterans benefits, and community resources.
When you work with military and veteran clients, there’s more to self-examine and more to just plain know. And the standards of ethical competence are more complex.
From informed consent when fitness for duty may be on the line – to boundaries when your client is also eating in the mess hall – to determining whether disability criteria continue to be met – there is a unique intersection of military-connected challenges and professional ethics codes.
In this session, Duane K. L. France, MA, MBA, LPC – Army veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, author of Combat Vet Don’t Mean Crazy: Veteran Mental Health in Post-Military Life, and host of the Behind the Mission podcast – will show you how to navigate the complex treatment needs and regulatory demands of service members and veterans. You’ll learn:
- How to build a foundation of trust based on high ethical standards with military and veteran clients
- A framework to address the ethical imperative of balancing individual needs with broader systems
- Strategies for integrating cross-disciplinary ethical standards
Program Information
Objectives
- Analyze how ethical principles are adapted and applied within the specialized cultural context of military and veteran clients.
- Utilize ethical standards from the ACA, APA, NASW, AAMFT, and NAADAC to address the unique intersection of professional codes and military-connected challenges.
- Integrate specific competencies to navigate the complex treatment needs and regulatory demands of service members and veterans.
Outline
Foundational Ethical Principles with Military-Connected Clients
- Autonomy, nonmaleficence, beneficence, justice, fidelity, veracity
- Alignment with professional codes of ethics – ACA, APA, NASW, AAMFT, NAADAC
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Ethical Competencies
- Experiential competence
- Professional intentionality
- Ethical bracketing
- Proactive consultation
- Legal and regulatory compliance
- Sustained self-care
- Reflexive self-awareness
- Working in military settings
- Due relationships in military and community settings
- Disclosure requirements, confidentiality, and informed consent
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage and Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Other Mental Health Professionals
Copyright :
11/06/2026
Understanding Military Culture: A Guide for Behavioral Healthcare Providers
Your ability to have a positive impact on military service members and veterans hinges on one simple question – do you understand their culture and how it clashes with elements of the overarching culture of behavioral healthcare? Without understanding military morals, values, and beliefs, you won’t establish effective rapport and create treatment plans that work. This recorded session will give you a deeper look at military culture as concrete strategies for assessment and treatment.
Program Information
Objectives
- Demonstrate the importance of military cultural competence.
- Argue a purpose for the customs, traditions, and ethos of the military culture.
- Utilize the Cultural Formulation Interview for military members.
Outline
- Is there a military culture?
- Ethos, military values and beliefs
- Tenets and purpose of the military ethos
- Culture clash: what happens when military culture meets behavioral health culture?
- Diversity in the military
- Taking a military history: what (and what not) to ask
- Using the Military Cultural Formulation Interview
- Military and veteran families
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage & Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Nurses
- Other mental health professionals
Copyright :
11/14/2022
Culturally Competent Assessment of Military Service Members and Veterans
The military represents a unique culture, one which consists of its own belief systems, norms of behavior, laws, ethos, and even language. Evaluation and treatment of service members can be difficult at best, and ineffective at worst, when military cultural variables are not considered. Variables such as specific occupation, unit mission, rank, deployment history, family dynamics in the context of military service, leadership, motivation to serve, and command resources – to name a few – all can have a profound impact on case conceptualizations, treatment strategies, and ultimate fitness for duty determinations. This presentation will provide assessment techniques unique to service members which will enhance rapport, improve the accuracy of case conceptualization, and increase the efficacy of provider recommendations.
Program Information
Objectives
- Define cultural competence as it pertains to the provision of mental health services to service members and veterans.
- Incorporate military-specific assessment components into the case conceptualization of service members and veterans.
- Develop and maintain military cultural competence.
- Utilize military instructions and guidelines relevant to mental health treatment.
- Identify and address at least two barriers to care affecting military and veteran clients.
Outline
Military Cultural Competence
- Definition and importance
- Building rapport with a service member or veteran
Unique Components of the Military Mental Health Evaluation
- Identification of pertinent clinical, ethical and legal variables
- Finding and using relevant military instructions
- Incorporating cultural variables into the service member or veteran assessment
- Conceptualizing fitness for duty evaluations
- Tailoring clinical recommendations
Developing Cultural Competence
- Methods for developing and maintaining competence
- Resources for developing and maintaining competence
Target Audience
- Addiction Professionals
- Licensed Clinical/Mental Health Counselors
- Marriage & Family Therapists
- Psychologists
- Social Workers
Copyright :
11/06/2023
Crisis Response Planning and Lethal Means Counseling to Reduce Military and Veteran Suicide
Treating a client in a suicidal crisis is nerve-wracking enough on its own, but what if you’re working with a client who has access to and advanced knowledge of weapons? This recorded session provides essential information on two effective suicide prevention tools for use with military service members and veterans, Crisis Response Planning and Lethal Means Counseling. You’ll get specific strategies for conducting client-centered narrative assessments of suicide risk and a tailored crisis response plan that prioritizes self-management strategies and reducing access to firearms.
Program Information
Objectives
- Conduct a narrative assessment with a suicidal military service member or veteran.
- Distinguish the core components of a crisis response plan.
- Develop a means safety plan with a suicidal individual.
Outline
- Understanding suicidal behaviors in military service members and veterans
- Assessment tools that build a collaborative relationship
- How to develop a crisis response plan
- Have the conversation: Lethal means counseling
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage & Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Nurses
- Other mental health professionals
Copyright :
11/15/2022
Trauma-Related Insomnia
Untreated sleep problems wreak havoc on your ability to effectively treat patients, particularly when it comes to trauma-related insomnia in the military service members and veterans. Though contributing factors aren’t well-understood, higher rates of sleep disorders in these populations means that you must be prepared. Learn how to go beyond sleep hygiene – and why you should – to provide your military and veteran clients with simple, evidence-based interventions to improve their sleep.
Program Information
Objectives
- Analyze the three causal factors of chronic insomnia.
- Assess the impact of fear of sleep has in traumatized clients.
- Utilize three CBT strategies to alleviate symptoms of insomnia.
Outline
- Sleep problems in military and veteran populations: possible causes and consequences
- Three causal factors of insomnia: low deep sleep drive, body clock input, conditioned arousal
- Impact of trauma and trauma symptoms on sleep in military and veteran populations
- Cognitive Behavioral Insomnia strategies: stimulus control, sleep scheduling, cognitive therapy
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage & Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Nurses
- Occupational Therapists
- Other mental health professionals
Copyright :
11/14/2022
The Chronic Pain Foxhole
Without a fundamental understanding of military culture and how service members and veterans view pain, you’ll be unprepared to help your clients manage the complex issues they face and have the highest quality of life. This recorded session will help you understand the most common causes of chronic pain in the military population, deliver a variety of nonpharmacological strategies to relieve chronic pain, and create an effective interdisciplinary treatment team.
Program Information
Objectives
- Assess the prevalence, causes and characteristics of chronic pain in military and veteran populations.
- Determine the roles and responsibilities of the mental health provider on an interdisciplinary chronic pain team.
- Utilize nonpharmacological strategies to relieve chronic pain.
Outline
- The prevalence and epidemiology of pain in active-duty military and veterans
- Comparison of military versus civilian pain medicine
- Military culture and attitudes toward pain management
- The inter-disciplinary treatment pathway and clinic functions used to treat chronic pain
- Lessons learned – effective nonpharmacologic methods for alleviating chronic pain
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage & Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Nurses
- Other mental health professionals
Copyright :
11/15/2022
Concussion and TBI in Military and Veteran Populations
Though largely “invisible injuries,” traumatic brain injury and concussion history can severely complicate your treatment efforts. In this recorded session, you’ll learn essential techniques you can use in your practice to rehabilitate cognitive skills that are commonly impaired as a result of TBI. Improve your clients’ self-efficacy and help them take control of their symptoms as you understand how fatigue, mood, anxiety, trauma, and chronic pain affect cognitive performance.
Program Information
Objectives
- Analyze the effect of traumatic brain injury on the structure and function of the central nervous system.
- Utilize at least two evidence-based strategies to improve cognitive function following traumatic brain injury.
- Design interventions that help clients understand mind-body interactions related to functional neurological symptoms.
Outline
- Mechanics and neuropathology associated with traumatic brain injury common in military settings
- Evidence-based techniques designed to improve function and performance of common cognitive declines in TBI
- Mood, anxiety, trauma and chronic pain matter more than you might think – how to identify and treat functional neurological symptoms
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage & Family Therapists
- Addiction Counselors
- Nurses
- Occupational Therapists
- Other mental health professionals
Copyright :
11/15/2022
*SPEAKER SHELL* DO NOT USE: 2-Day Military and Veterans Mental Health Summit
Copyright :
11/05/2026