EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation Reprocessing) is a therapeutic approach which aims to reduce distress associated with stressful or traumatic events. It has been found to be very effective in the treatment of trauma. When a person experiences a traumatic event, their brain may not be able to process the information associated with this event like a normal memory. As a result, the information becomes stuck or ‘frozen’ on a neurological level. When this happens, a person may keep re-experiencing what occurred during a distressing event, such as what they saw, heard, felt or tasted. This can be very intense and unpleasant even long after the trauma.

EMDR enables the frozen information to be unblocked and processed like a normal memory, which leads to reduction or elimination of distress associated with the traumatic event. During the EMDR process, the right and left brain hemispheres are stimulated with eye movement, sounds or taps to help with the processing of information.

Although such an intervention may seem simple, EMDR is a comprehensive psychological treatment approach which uses protocols and procedures and is based on certain principles to obtain desirable results.

One of the basic differences between CBT and EMDR is that in CBT a person uses rational thinking and behaviour to change the way they feel, while in EMDR the change is achieved by stimulating the brain, without involving the rational brain.