What if They’re Right? Making Clinical Distinctions and Treatment Considerations for the Health-Anxious Client - 3 hours
To access the discount form for registering for multiple workshops or participants, please click here.
When & Where:
- Date: Friday, June 5, 2026
- If you cannot attend this workshop on 6/5, you can pre-register for the on-demand version here: https://www.theknowledgetree.org/p/health-anxious-...
- Time: 1:00pm – 4:15pm Eastern Time
- CE Hours Included: 3 (please see below for details)
- Location: Live Interactive Webinar (“Synchronous”) on Zoom
- Investment: $87 before Friday, May 22nd at 5:00pm Eastern Time, $97 after
- Presented by: Michael Stier, LCPC (see bio below)
- Workshop Recording: A recording of this workshop will be available to review for 60 days, and should be available within two weeks of the live presentation. However, participants must attend live to receive the "Synchronous" CE Certificate.
- Instruction Level: Intermediate
- Target Audience: Psychologists, Counselors, Social Workers, Marriage & Family Therapists
Educational Objectives:
After completing this workshop in its entirety, you will be able to:
- Evaluate the clinical relationship between "diagnostic overshadowing" and the risk of underdiagnosing medical conditions in patients previously labeled with health anxiety.
- Assess how complicating factors, including perfectionism, emotional avoidance, and medical complicating factors, impact a patient's cognitive interpretation of physical sensations.
- Outline the ways to be able to integrate evidence-based interventions from ERP and ACT to treat Health Anxiety while balancing the considerations of pre-existing and/or developing medical conditions.
Workshop Description:
When a client presents with persistent physical complaints, is your first instinct to treat the worry or investigate the medical picture? This 3-hour workshop explores the complex clinical intersection where navigating medical conditions (whether known or unknown) meets anxiety around health. Clinicians often face the risk of "diagnostic overshadowing," where a mental health label prematurely halts the search for legitimate medical issues.
This course goes beyond the "nuts and bolts" of standard protocols to examine the complicating factors that make these cases so difficult to navigate. We will explore how "unfounded" health issues, medical complexities, and past medical trauma create a logical foundation for hyper-vigilance. Participants will learn to identify the psychological drivers, such as perfectionism, emotional avoidance, and rigid belief systems, that interact with physical sensations to maintain the cycle of distress. By the end of this session, clinicians will have a roadmap for navigating the complexities between validating the patient's medical reality while managing their anxiety.
Course Outline:
- Section 1: Considerations of the "Anxiety" Label (60 mins)
- Defining Diagnostic Overshadowing and the risks of underdiagnosing medical symptoms while overdiagnosing psychologically.
- The complication of "Real" symptoms: making distinctions between “real” and “reliable” symptoms while exploring the classifications of medical, physical, and psychological sensations.
- Addressing the invalidation that can occur for clients in the professional and personal environments around their health worries.
- Understanding the impact that cultural, societal, and other identifying factors can have on the care that is received in the medical community.
- Section 2: Complicating Factors in the Intersection Between Medical and Psychological (60 mins)
- Describing differences between multiple domains of symptom-based disorders, such as health anxiety, anxiety around health, and healthcare anxiety.
- How perfectionism, intolerance of uncertainty, elevated responsibility, and other core beliefs can influence the course of treatment.
- Understanding the role of symptoms that clients experience with no clear diagnosis, including the role of chronic health conditions.
- How to address the dynamics of health anxiety with co-occurring medical conditions.
- How trauma, beliefs, and past experiences can impact the development and maintenance of health anxiety.
- Section 3: Clinical Protocols and Considerations (60 mins)
- Treatment considerations to note when working with the combination of medical conditions and health anxiety.
- Training patients to describe "weird sensations" objectively without immediately assigning a catastrophic diagnosis.
- Creating ritual prevention and exposure challenges for the health-anxious client.
- The importance of partnering with physicians to ensure "Reasonable Medical Clearance" is achieved before pivoting to psychotherapy work.
- Learning ways to be able to use ACT principles to help patients move forward even when their body feels "noisy" or medically uncertain.
Workshop Schedule (Eastern Time):
- 12:30pm - 1:00pm | Sign-In and Welcome
- 1:00pm - 2:30pm | Session
- 2:30pm - 2:45pm | Break
- 2:45pm - 4:15pm | Session
- 4:15pm | Continuing Education Certificates Available
Presented by: Michael Stier, LCPC, LPC, NCC
Michael is a Licensed Clinical Professional Counselor (LCPC) in Illinois, an LPC in Georgia and Missouri, and a National Certified Counselor (NCC) specializing in OCD and related disorders. He currently serves as the Director of Education and Training at Anxiety Specialists of Atlanta, overseeing evidence-based treatment interventions. Michael is also faculty for the Behavioral Therapy Training Institute (BTTI) through the IOCDF. He co-authored The Complete Guide to Overcoming Health Anxiety and developed the associated Overcoming Health Anxiety website, which provides evidence-based information and support for individuals with health anxiety, as well as their families and loved ones.
3 CE Hours Included - Details by License Type Below:
- PSYCHOLOGISTS: The Knowledge Tree, A Summit Professional Education Company is approved by the American Psychological Association to sponsor continuing education for psychologists. The Knowledge Tree, A Summit Professional Education Company maintains responsibility for this program and its content. For more detailed information on the current CE ruling in Georgia, or if you are licensed in another state or country, please click here.
- COUNSELORS: The Knowledge Tree, A Summit Professional Education Company has been approved by the National Board for Certified Counselors (NBCC) as an Approved Continuing Education Provider (ACEP), ACEP No. 7153. Programs that do not qualify for NBCC credit are clearly identified. The Knowledge Tree, A Summit Professional Education Company is solely responsible for all aspects of the programs. Please click here for more detailed information.
- SOCIAL WORKERS: TKT has applied for approval for this workshop through the Georgia Society for Clinical Social Work (GSCSW). If you are licensed in another state or country, please click here for more detailed information.
- MARRIAGE & FAMILY THERAPISTS: TKT has applied for approval for this workshop through the Georgia Association for Marriage & Family Therapy (GAMFT). If you are licensed in another state or country, please click here for more detailed information.
Registration: To register for individual workshops, you may use our online payment option, or to pay by check you may print and complete the Registration Form and mail or fax it to our office. The registration form is available on our website: www.theknowledgetree.org. Registration is permitted until the time the workshop begins, unless otherwise specified.
Multiple Workshop Special: There is a 10% Discount with registration for two workshops. There is a 15% Discount with registrations for three or four workshops. There is a 20% Discount with registration for five or more workshops.
Refund/Cancellation Policy: If you can no longer attend a workshop you have registered for, you can either receive a credit for another workshop or receive a refund if you are within the refund policy period. Refunds will be given for cancellations received at least five days prior to the workshop. More information about refund/cancellation can be found here.
Attendance Policy: 100% attendance and completion of a course evaluation is required at any CE program in order to receive credit for that CE program. No partial credit is given. Certificates of completion will be available in each attendee’s account once the broadcast has ended and the course evaluation completed.
ADA Requests: We will make every effort to accommodate any reasonable ADA request. Please call or email us at least two weeks prior to the event. Payment and registration are required to fulfill an ADA request.
No Conflict Policy: Neither The Knowledge Tree nor its speakers have received any commercial support for this program or its contents and will not receive any commercial support prior to or during this program.
System Requirements: Live Interactive Webinars are facilitated via Zoom. System requirements for the Zoom platform are linked at our FAQ page.
We are an approved vendor for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs for easy reimbursement of educational expenses for VA employees.
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For information about our Continuing Education Workshops, please contact our Customer Service team at: theknowledgetree@summit.zendesk.com |
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