Alternatives to talking therapies in treating PTSD

Talking therapies (counselling/psychotherapy) have long been used to treat Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, but this is not the only way.

EMDR (eye movement desensitization and readjustment therapy) has had dramatic effects in recent years on alleviating PTSD. This was pioneered by Francine Shapiro while working with Vietnam veterans suffering from PTSD who had made little progress with talking therapy. She noticed that rapid eye movement had a significant effect on her own responses related to troublesome memories. She discovered this by accident, but related it to REM sleep where memories are processed and appropriately filed. Research lead to realising that traumatic memories are stored in the wrong form of memory. Instead of being stored in narrative memory without pain, they are stored in non-declarative memory where they hold the emotions and body sensations of the trauma. EMDR corrects this by processing the memory into the correct form in which it can then be looked at by the individual without bringing up all the pain and body sensations associated with the trauma.

Mindfulness is also beneficial to PTSD as it stimulates the Medial PreFrontal Cortex. In PTSD the critical balance between the amygdala and the MPFC shifts making it much harder to deal with emotions. Mindfulness strengthens the MPFC to help restore balance and thus alleviate PTSD.

Perhaps therapy using these techniques for PTSD could be used alongside traditional talking therapies.

References: The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel Van Der Kolk. 2014. EMDR by Francine Shapiro 1997.