In March 2025, Mark Linington and Emma Jack attended the ISSTD Conference in Boston. CDS Trustee Julia Beker and associate therapist Judith Marlow were also there to present and learn. Below, Emma shares some thoughts on the experience…
“I had a thought provoking time in Boston for the ISSTD Conference and learned a number of things that I will be researching back here and discussing with the wider CDS team.
I focused the sessions I went to around diagnostic challenges and assessment tools. I attended a full day learning about the usefulness and application of the Multidimensional Inventory of Dissociation (MID) with Dr Michael Coy and Jennifer Madere. I was interested to see if it might be useful at times in our assessment process or early in treatment. It is administered in a very different way to the SCID-D and could be valuable as a tool where we are less certain at the outset of the depth of dissociative symptoms. I will be thinking further initially with Lora Dimitrova who I hope, can help me to understand the full range of pros and cons.
The second tool I took a deep dive into was the TADS-I which was developed by Suzette Boon. Her presentation illuminated the way in which it takes a broader look at trauma symptoms and has the capability to explore trauma symptoms in connection with a PTSD or BPD diagnosis. This is something that is (to my mind) is a little lacking in the SCID-D. I will investigate this tool further and potentially see if further training in it would be a good next step.
I went to a very interesting presentation by a group of psychiatrists, Benjamin Israel, Judith Lewis, and Tim Brewerton. Their presentation was titled ‘Complex Trauma and Dissociation: What Psychiatrists Need to Know….But May Not’. They spoke about the way in which psychiatrists (in the USA) are trained and the lack of understanding around trauma. They talked through the big ‘misdiagnoses’ and the ways in which dissociation has been confused, in particular, with psychosis. They talked through the Schneiderian First Rank symptoms and how one might begin thinking in such a way you could tease apart delusion and dissociation. I really enjoyed this talk and feel inspired to add some of this thinking to a training Nancy and I are running in Bristol.
Judith Herman’s keynote lecture was also a standout moment and her recent research around justice had Mark and I pondering the ways in which the clinic could begin to think about justice (in a much wider way than just criminal justice) and to support our patients to feel we are alongside them in their various justice journeys.”
Emma Jack – Clinical Director – CDS UK
