Tracking progress is an important part of therapy

Published on 26 August 2025 at 18:20

Throughout treatment, I often invite clients to complete short questionnaires. These tools help us see how symptoms are shifting over time and ensure that the therapy I provide is making a difference.

From a sample of 88 clients over the past 18 months, my latest outcome measures are showing improvements for clients on two symptom serevity measures I commonly use:

PCL-5: measures PTSD symptoms in line with the DSM-5-TR.
DASS-21: measures overall psychological distress, with subscales for depression, anxiety, and stress.

I’ll soon be adding the Trauma Recovery Measure (Smith, 2022) to better track how people move through the early, middle, and later stages of trauma recovery. This will help pinpoint areas that may need more work and continue to improve treatment outcomes.

If you want to find out why therapy may not be working for you and factors that can prevent progress, read my blog: 'Why Don’t People Always Improve in Therapy?'

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