The Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing

A new and a typically non-traditional psychotherapy, Eye movement desensitization

and reprocessing was developed by Francine Shapiro who was an American psychologist in
1980s. This unique technique was created to overcome the devastating and disturbing effects
of the psychological traumas. The clinicians witnessed its effectiveness in treating post
traumatic stress disorder. This cost effective therapy has now been widely used to transform
live for the good. The eight-phase therapy addresses the traumatic experiences which
overwhelm the natural resilience of brain or the coping capacity of clients. With the help and
appropriate use of EMDR the patients have successfully reprocess mentally the unpleasant
event until the event no longer disturbs or distresses them psychologically. This technique
also tends to give an insight about the event and associate it with some degree of positive
belief. For instance, a rape victim after EMDR will come to realize that whatsoever happened
was not her fault and the traumatic event is over now thus a general sense of safe world can
be regained. This psychological technique opens up new windows which enables patient to
come up with new solutions to the problems and thus help in overcoming the trauma. In this
psychological intervention, the client is in full in charge of his or her disturbing thoughts
which makes them realize that the power is not lost and is still in their hands. The
physiological arousal due to stress is also reduced with this technique (Silver, 2009).

Working and stages of EMDR

How EMDR actually works is an interest area for many researchers. The studies depict
that this technique works by making the client recall the disturbing event and then divert the
attention from that event to a more positive one. This technique helps client is taking control
of the upsetting and disturbing thoughts. The therapist in some initial sessions will discuss
about the disturbing thoughts and identify the trauma the patient is experiencing. Later, the

therapist will teach some relaxation techniques and once the patient is all set the technique
may then be administered. At first the patient will experience increased stress and disturbance
but this will be alleviated gradually as the technique continues. The patient will be asked to
think of a positive image and associate it. The therapist will continue the use of eye
movement until or unless all the distress feelings are vanished. At the end the therapist will
calm down the patient with any of the relaxation technique. This technique works in a way
that the client is asked to shift thoughts from negative to more positive ones. This therapy
involves the approach to the emotional and psychological problems in a very unusual manner.
No medication or talk therapy is actually required. Infact, the rapid and rhythmic eye
movement of the patient is used that can dampen the intensity of the emotionally charged past
traumatic event memories (Goldberg, 2015).
The appropriate and effective use of this technique does not require the therapist to just
move his or her fingers in front of patients eyes. This technique involves certain aspects of
various other psychotherapies and makes it an appropriate intervention. The technique
involves a session of approximately 90 minutes which involves the following eight phases:

Stage 1 History and treatment planning: In the first phase of EMDR, the traumatic
experiences that are disturbing and stressful for the patient are assessed. The issues as
well as the major triggering symptoms that the client wishes to alleviate and discussed

appropriately and treatment goals are set mutually.

Stage 2 Preparation: The second phase of this technique enables the therapist to
carefully assess and make sure that the client is in a stable state of re-experiencing the
traumatic event. The therapist needs to assure that the patient is capable of talking
about the stressful event and if not then certain relaxation techniques can be taught so
that the client can make use of them while discussing the event. It is critically

significant for the client to be in an appropriate state of mentally going through the
trauma again.

Stage 3 Assessment: The third phase of this therapy begins by firstly identifying and
then discussing all the emotions, bodily sensations, beliefs and images that are

associated with the traumatic event.

Stage 4 Desensitization: Phase four involves making the patient focus and think
about all the beliefs, sensations, emotions and the associated images while following

the fingers of therapist that makes a back and forth movement.

Stage 5 Installation: In the stage five of the eye movement desensitization technique,
the client is repeatedly ask to think about all the related aspects of the stressful and
traumatic event until or unless he or she no longer feels disturbed or distressed while

thinking about them.

Stage 6 Body scan: In the sixth phase of the EMDR technique, the patient is asked to
think of and focus on positive belief. This positive thought or belief has been initially

discussed by the client and the therapist in the first stage.

Stage 7 Closure: The stage seven of this therapy instructs the patient to write
comprehensively about anything that can be referred to the distressful and unpleasant

event and it may occur after the last treatment session.

Stage 8 Re-evaluation: In the last phase of eye movement desensitization and
reprocessing technique, all the changes that are witnessed and brought about in the
patients situation are appropriately evaluated and assessed. The therapist will ask the
patient to rate the level of distress (Rothmayr, 2013).

Critical analysis
The eye movement desensitization and reprocessing technique is the newly developed
technique which has been used widely around the globe for treating patients who are

suffering from post traumatic stress disorder. This technique is basically used to remove the
triggered symptoms or to manage the conditions of patient who have experienced a trauma.
Despite the fruitful benefit of this technique, it does not stand without any disadvantages or
negative effects. Together with the strengths that fortify the effectiveness of this technique,
the prevailing weaknesses make it lose its credibility when applying for treatment. Much
debate has been done and criticisms on the part of this therapy make it a very popular
treatment. This psychological intervention requires research and investigation that can
highlight the usefulness of this technique and can help therapist in using this technique more
confidently with better results (Devilly, 2012).
Following are the potential benefits and drawbacks of EMDR:

Potential benefits
This technique is new, relatively but undoubtedly it has been credited for bring
outstanding improvements in the conditions of the patient of post-traumatic stress disorder.
The EMDR therapy is especially used for the treatment of PTSD patients because it simply
does not make the therapist to go into further details about the stressful event or the traumatic
memories. In the use of other talk therapies, the traumatic event which is causing stress is
analyzed deeply and for a longer period of time hence going into so much detail can disturb
the patient rigorously. Another benefit of using this technique for managing patients of post
traumatic stress disorder is that, it works and involves body, emotions as well as mind at the
same time and this can successfully highlight the intellectual understanding of the problem
and its origin. In this way, the symptoms of the stress can be cleared up for improvement. The
major advantage of the therapy EMDR is that although patients are asked to re-experience the
traumatic event that is causing stress but this experience is for a very short duration thus the

patient is not disturbed by to a great extent. And simultaneously, reprocessing of cognitions

are occurring together with the memory recall which makes EMDR different from other
ordinary talk therapies. The speed with which this therapy resolves the emotionally deep
seated traumatic issues enables it to be effectively used by the therapists. This therapy has
been providing successful improvement just in one session and this remarkable quality of
EMDR proves to be its essential strength in managing patients suffering from post traumatic
stress disorder. The most astonishing and impressive advantage of using eye movement
therapy is that it is responsible for successfully alleviating the stress symptoms in the patient
which can bring improvements. This has been witnessed especially in the case of rape
victims. This technique is less invasive emotionally as compare to other treatments. And
undoubtedly, the administration of EMDR on the management of post traumatic stress
disorder is much better than no treatment. This therapy is particularly most beneficial for the
patients of PTSD who have trouble talking about the traumatic event (Scott, 2012).
Potential drawbacks
No matter how good and effective this technique proves to be, it is nearly impossible
to say that it is without any flaws or drawbacks. The major flaw of the eye movement
desensitization reprocessing is that is has only been witnessed in bringing effective results
and improvements in the treatment of post traumatic stress disorder patients and not on the
patients of other stress disorders like phobia, obsessive compulsive disorder or even panic
attacks. This turns out to be a major weakness of this technique that it has been limited to
only the treatment of post traumatic stress disorder. This therapy was particularly created for
treating as well as managing traumas so this technique involves a deep focus on intense
distressing and traumatic events and this makes this therapy not to be used on people with
heart or eye problems and pregnant women. People with sensitive health or other issues
cannot be the ones on which this technique could be administered. This makes EMDR limited

to only a certain amount of population and not to everyone. Another flaw that can be
considered while applying the EMDR technique for treatment is the fact, that this technique
is new and requires major and numerous explorations for learning about its effectiveness and
long term results. Not much controlled studies have been conducted in past to investigate the
effectiveness of EMDR in treating PTSD hence the therapist needs to keep this aspect in
mind while administering it. The eye movement desensitization and reprocessing technique
cannot be administered by just any or every psychologist, therefore proper training is
mandatory and also adequate skills are required to use this technique effectively and hope for
results. Without initial mandatory training, the clients safety can be at stake. The cognitive
behavioural therapy is the one to which EMDR resembles the most especially desensitization
process. This fact makes this technique lose its credibility and can be considered the weak
area of EMDR.
The negative side effects of EMDR are simply inevitable and include mainly the
tendency of the patient to make negative memories seem extremely unclear and of course,
distant. Another side effect is that this technique has the capability of bringing back some
memories strongly enough that the patients have the same emotion with the same intensity as
at the time of trauma (Scott, 2012)