Detail 1

WHAT IS EMDR

EMDR is an integrative, psychotherapeutic approach that consists of :

• a desensitization procedure 

• coupled with various interventions and processing designed to bring the client into a more adaptive mental, emotional and physical state (Shapiro, 1998) - in other words, to reprocess the issue/event etc.

  • including the step by step process formulated by Ana M Gomez to make EMDR effective and developmentally appropriate for children

Detail 2

The EMDR psychotherapeutic method is comprised of various elements of traditional approaches together with innovative aspects.

Traditional elements include :

• the targeting of present stimuli (behavioural),

• attention to negative and positive self-attributions (mental),

• recognition of developmental issues (psychodynamic), and

• attention to bodily sensations (physical somatic).

Nontraditional elements include

• dual focus (past event and present processing) of attention, and

• bilateral sensory stimulation for example, finger movements **our left brain and right brain have different functions and the use of eye movements stimulates both halves of the brain to decrease the vividness of the traumatic images, to allow the traumatic event to be remembered in a positive manner

Interventions are targeted through mental, emotional, physical somatic modalities, including the neurobiology of information processing & EMDR as researched and presented by Dr Uri Bergmann, PhD by taking a glimpse inside the brain.

Detail 3

EMDR was initially introduced into the professional literature as a treatment for trauma (Shapiro, 1989, 1995). Trauma can be a either a big-‘T’ event such as a motor vehicle accident, or can be a small-’t’ event such as a niggling pain that we can ignore most of the time which can also lead in to becoming a chronic pain.

EMDR now presents itself as a possible treatment for chronic pain for a number of reasons: 

(a) EMDR has been found to be effective with trauma, which is recognised as being one of the primary risk factors for chronic pain (Sanders, 2000); 

(b) chronic pain itself represents a kind of “small-t” trauma, due to the major life-changing events that are typically associated with it such as

-   inability to work,  -   significant loss of income,  -   marital/ family stress, etc.; 

(c) the emotional focus of EMDR appears to be consistent with what we now believe to be the neurophysiological mechanisms of pain, particularly in terms of the involvement of :

- the amygdala or our ‘fire alarm’ system that alerts us to danger, - the hippocampus is associated with our memory system, and  - the prefrontal cortex or our Executive Control/ brain processing system 

(d) EMDR results in a significant reduction in disturbing feelings and sensations

(e) there have been several case reports of EMDR helping to facilitate pain relief (Grant, 2000; Hekmat, Groth, & Rogers, 1994; McCann, 1992; Wilson, Becker, & Tinker, 1997).