EYE-MOVEMENT DESENSITIZATION AND REPROCESSING (EDMR) TREATMENT FOR COMBAT-RELATED POSTTRAUMATIC-STRESS-DISORDER

Despite the clinical and social impact of posttraumatic stress disorde r (PTSD), there are few controlled studies investigating its treatment . In this investigation, the effectiveness of two psychotherapeutic in terventions for PTSD were compared using a randomized controlled outco me group design. Thirty five combat veterans diagnosed with combat-rel ated PTSD were treated with either (a) 12 sessions of eye movement des ensitization and reprocessing, EMDR (n = 10), (b) 12 sessions of biofe edback-assisted relaxation (n = 13), or (c) routine clinical care, sew ing as a control (n = 12). Compared with the other conditions signific ant treatment effects in the EMDR condition were obtained at posttreat ment on a number of self-report, psychometric, and standardized interv iew measures Relative to the other treatment group, these effects were generally maintained at 3-month follow-up. Psychophysiological measur es reflected an apparent habituation effect from pretreatment to postt reatment but were not differentially affected by treatment condition.