Course Description

How often do you have a client who appears to have made progress in processing a target, but the SUDS will not go below a 3? What about clients who appear to be disturbed but report a SUDS of 0. As simple a scale as SUDS appears to be, in many cases clients become confused and report a level of disturbance that is not accurate, causing EMDR processing to be needlessly extended or conversely prematurely terminated. The actual meaning of “distress” in SUDS is not as clear as it seems. In this presentation, common situations will be illustrated through clinical videos, and simple solutions will be offered. If this phenomenon arises for you, this presentation will make you a more efficient and effective EMDR therapist.

Learning Objectives

1. Participants will be able to describe the precise meaning of Subjective Units of Disturbance (SUDS), and explain the important role the SUD Scale has played in EMDR practice and research since the introduction of EMDR.
2. Participants will be able to list three common client misunderstandings in EMDR Therapy of the meaning of SUDS, and describe how clarifying these misunderstandings facilitates resolution.
3. Participants will be able to explain six simple ways that clients’ understandings of SUDS can be clarified.

Presenter(s)

Philip Manfield, Ph.D.

Philip Manfield, Ph.D., is the developer of the flash technique, an EMDR-based intervention that permits the processing of trauma virtually painlessly. Developed in 2016 for use in the preparation phase of EMDR, it makes possible the processing of extremely disturbing memories that clients might otherwise be unwilling to address. As an EMDRIA-approved EMDR Trainer and in training over 18,000 clinicians worldwide in Flash, he has observed some basic sources of confusion in the way EMDR is practiced. One of these is the common misunderstanding of SUDS ratings that cause clients to inaccurately report the level of disturbance of their target memories inaccurately.