PTSD & Trauma
Post-traumatic stress disorder develops after exposure to a traumatic event and persists in a minority of those exposed. It is treatable, and treatment works better than most people expect.
What are the symptoms of PTSD?
- Re-experiencing — intrusive memories, nightmares, flashbacks
- Avoidance — of reminders, places, people, or of thinking about it at all
- Negative changes in mood and thinking — persistent guilt or shame, detachment, inability to feel positive emotion, distorted self-blame
- Hyperarousal — startle response, hypervigilance, irritability, poor sleep, difficulty concentrating
That last cluster is why PTSD is sometimes mistaken for ADHD. Hypervigilance consumes the same attentional resources, and the resulting difficulty concentrating looks similar from outside. See adult ADHD.
Does trauma have to be life-threatening?
The formal diagnostic criteria require exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury or sexual violence. But people are affected by experiences outside that definition — medical trauma, prolonged emotional abuse, childhood neglect, traumatic birth — and those responses are real and treatable regardless of which label applies. We are more interested in what you are experiencing than in whether it meets a threshold.
How is PTSD treated?
Trauma-focused psychotherapy has the strongest evidence — prolonged exposure, cognitive processing therapy and EMDR all have substantial support. Medication, principally SSRIs/SNRIs/SerMs, are effective and work well alongside therapy.
Sleep and nightmares are worth treating specifically rather than waiting for them to improve with everything else, because sleep disruption maintains the rest of the symptom picture. We provide the medication side and refer for trauma-focused therapy; please see our resources page for a list of local clinicians. You can also seek additional resources via PsychologyToday.com.
Will I have to talk about what happened?
Not necessarily with us, beyond what you choose to share. Psychiatric medication management does not require recounting the trauma, and we will not ask you to. Trauma-focused therapy does involve processing the event, and that is done at a pace you control with a clinician (aka counselor, therapist, psychologist) trained for it. Being able to separate those two things — medication now, processing when you are ready — is often what makes starting feel possible.
If you are in crisis, please immediately call or text 988 for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, or call 911. Safety is our top priority, and our outpatient office is not equipped to handle emergencies.
Treatment in person and throughout Arizona
We see patients in person at our office in Glendale (in the Arrowhead area) and via telehealth anywhere in Arizona — from Tucson, to Flagstaff, to the east valley, and everywhere between. Virtual visits are the same appointment with the same provider at the same rate.
Getting Started
Our comprehensive, new patient evaluations are $375 and require 60 to 90 minutes.
Our psychiatric follow-up visits are $125 and require 30 minutes.
(Thank you for arriving early, as we are unable to see late patients and must reschedule if life gets in the way of you arriving on time.)
We are out-of-network with all insurance carriers but will gladly provide a superbill you can submit to insurance to seek reimbursement.
For more info, please see our fees page.
Pinnacle Psychiatry
17505 N 79th Ave, Suite 309, Glendale, AZ 85308
Phone 623.321.2221 · Text 877.749.7502
Monday–Wednesday 8:00am–5:00pm · Thursday 7:00am–5:00pm