The Impact of Diagnostic Uncertainty in Complex, Multi-System Chronic Illness
Psychotherapy Strategies to Restore Agency & Reduce Shame
- Speaker:
- Kanjana Hartshorne, LCSW, C-IAYT, CCFP, Reiki Master
- Duration:
- 1 Hour 05 Minutes
- Format:
- Audio and Video
- Copyright:
-
Jul 16, 2026
- Product Code:
- POS150880
- Media Type:
- Digital Seminar
Description
When clients’ physical symptoms don’t follow predictable patterns and a clear diagnosis is delayed or never comes, they live in a state of ongoing uncertainty that makes it hard to know how to move forward.
And without specialized training, therapists can unintentionally cause harm as they misunderstand clients’ focus on how their body feels as avoidant, resistant, obsessive, or lacking in insight.
With the rise in complex, multi-system, and often dismissed conditions like fibromyalgia, chronic Lyme, and long COVID, it’s more important than ever for therapists to have tools to restore agency, reduce shame, and address complex and layered grief related to changes in functioning and altered future expectations.
In this session, Kanjana Hartshorne – specialist in trauma-informed, body-based, and relational approaches to care – will share keys to help clients regain trust in their own bodies and experience in the face of diagnostic uncertainty. You’ll learn:
- How to find a balance between solution-focused and relational work
- Tools to counter self-blame and shame when clients experience skepticism from medical providers
- Strategies for meaning-making in ongoing illness
Credit
Speaker
Kanjana Hartshorne, LCSW, C-IAYT, CCFP, Reiki Master Related seminars and products
Healing Hearts Wellness
Kanjana Hartshorne, LCSW, C-IAYT, CCFP, Reiki Master, is a licensed clinical social worker, certified yoga therapist, and certified compassion fatigue professional. She is the owner of Healing Hearts Wellness, a group practice specializing in holistic, somatic, and relational approaches to mental health care. Her work focuses on supporting individuals, couples, and polycules navigating challenges in their relationship with their bodies, including chronic illness, medical trauma, and prolonged diagnostic uncertainty, with particular attention to shame, grief, and the psychological impact of systemic invalidation.
Kanjana brings a nuanced, ethically grounded perspective informed by both clinical practice and lived experience. She regularly provides clinical supervision, continuing education trainings, creation and research on yoga for mental health programs, and retreats for healthcare professionals. She leads the annual Body Compassion Project CE Retreat, a transformative learning experience for therapists, and speaks nationally on the ethical integration of ancestral and spiritual practices into clinical work, bridging research-informed approaches with what she describes as a blend of science and soul.
Speaker Disclosures:
Financial: Kanjana Hartshorne has an employment relationship with Healing Hearts Wellness, LLC. and Wanderhome Retreats. She receives a speaking honorarium and recording royalties from PESI, Inc. She has no relevant financial relationships with ineligible organizations.
Non-financial: Kanjana Hartshorne is a member of the Pennsylvania Society for Clinical Social Work and the National Association of Social Workers.
Additional Info
Access for Self-Study (Non-Interactive)Access never expires for this product.
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Additional CE Info
For a more detailed outline that includes times or durations of time, if needed, please contact cepesi@pesi.com.
Objectives
- Analyze how prolonged diagnostic uncertainty contributes to shame, grief, and decreased self-trust.
- Evaluate how common clinical patterns in complex, multi-system presentations impact treatment engagement and the therapeutic relationship.
- Utilize at least two strategies to support clients experiencing diagnostic uncertainty.
Outline
Diagnostic Uncertainty and Complex Chronic Illness
- What medical diagnostic uncertainty looks like in clinical mental health practice
- Common features of complex and multi-system presentations
- How diagnostic journeys impact identity, trust, and engagement in care
- Medical trauma - disbelief, dismissal, and fragmented care as sources of psychological harm
- How illness becomes moralized or individualized in clinical and cultural narratives
- Psychosomatic labeling, medical skepticism, and the internalization of systemic doubt as personal failure
- Parallels between chronic illness stigma and other forms of contextualized distress
- Systemic issues impacting individuals with intersecting, marginalized identities
Psychotherapy in the Face of Diagnostic Uncertainty and Complex Chronic Illness
- Support clients without reinforcing blame, helplessness, or false certainty
- Counter self-blame and mistrust in body and self
- Address grief, loss, and meaning-making in ongoing illness
- Tools and language that remain useful when symptoms fluctuate
- Finding a balance between solutions-focused work and relational work
Ethical and Relational Clinical Practice
- Maintain scope of practice while offering meaningful support
- Critically examine assumptions of resistance, over-focus on symptoms, and character disorder
- Avoid common pitfalls such as over-reassurance or jumping straight to reframing thought processes
- Recognize how well-intended therapeutic responses may not be appropriate
- Implicit bias, internalized ableism, and the tendency to prioritize medical opinion over lived experience
- Importance of cultural humility
- When to use self-disclosure
- Limitations of the research and potential risks
Target Audience
- Counselors
- Social Workers
- Psychologists
- Psychiatrists
- Marriage and Family Therapists
- Nurses
- Other Mental Health Professionals
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