Personality Disorders Update

By John M Oldham MD

In a series of earlier blogs (November, 2024 and August, 2025), a link is provided to brief videos I was invited to record for a medical education series hosted by Vumedi.com. Recently, I was asked to provide a new one, which has just been posted, entitled “Personality Disorders Update.” This time, I prepared about a 10 minute presentation using power points, and here is the link to it: https://www.vumedi.com/video/management-of-personality-disorders-key-updates-for-2025/. In this new update, I reviewed the principles underlying our npsp25.com website and its Personality Styles/Personality Disorders Continuum feature, a conceptual model illustrating the dimensional nature of personality styles and their extremes. That’s followed in the new video by a summary of the Alternative DSM-5 Model for Personality Disorders (AMPD), and then I describe a draft proposal for the next edition of the diagnostic manual. This proposal has been approved by the DSM Steering Committee (a formal group reviewing any proposed substantial changes for future editions). If given final approval by the American Psychiatric Association, this system would resemble the current AMPD but would focus more heavily on the fundamental elements central to the pathology common to all personality disorders: impairment in functioning in terms of a sense of self and in interpersonal relations.

John M. Oldham, M.D., & Lois B. Morris

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