“When I am breathless now, I don’t have the fear that’s linked to it.” A case series on the potential of EMDR to break the dyspnea-anxiety cycle in COPD
Hypothesis that EMDR in patients with chronic obstructive COPD improves breathlessness mastery by decreasing the anxiety component.
Article Abstract
“Background: Expectations can enhance the intensity and the neural processing of breathlessness. Previous breathlessness episodes may have a psychotraumatic effect and may influence perception of subsequent episodes. In post-traumatic stress disorder, eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) is the therapy of choice.
Aims and objectives: We explored the hypothesis that EMDR in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and previous severe breathlessness episodes improves breathlessness mastery by decreasing the anxiety component.
Methods: Since there is no previous research on this subject, we undertook a qualitative case series to explore it. We included four patients with COPD GOLD 4/D and refractory breathlessness who wished to undergo EMDR for traumatic breathlessness episodes. Amongst others, we used the Chronic Respiratory Disease Questionnaire (CRQ) before and after EMDR, and semi-structured, face-to-face, in-depth interviews.
Results: All patients had between 3 and 5 EMDR sessions. On CRQ, subset mastery, 3 patients had a large improvement and 1 patient a moderate improvement. On subset emotional functioning, 3 patients showed a large clinically relevant improvement and 1 patient showed no change. All patients made a distinction between ‘regular’ breathlessness and breathlessness intertwined with anxiety. They all stated that the anxiety component of their breathlessness diminished or disappeared. When asked whether they would recommend EMDR for other COPD patients, all four subjects answered positively.
Conclusions: There is ground for a randomized controlled clinical trial to test the effect of EMDR on breathlessness mastery in a subset of COPD patients with previous severe breathlessness episodes and high levels of anxiety.”
—Description from publisher
Article Access
Open Access
Mooren, K., Smit, K., Engels, Y., Janssen, D., & Godschalx, J. (2022). “When I am breathless now, I don’t have the fear that’s linked to it.” A case series on the potential of EMDR to break the dyspnea-anxiety cycle in COPD. BMC Preprint. Open access: https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-1607925/v1
Date
May 23, 2022
Creator(s)
Kris Mooren, Kirsten Smit, Yvonne Engels
Contributor(s)
Daisy Janssen, Judith Godschalx
Topics
Anxiety/Panic/Phobias, Medical/Somatic
Extent
12 pages
Publisher
Research Square (pre-print)
Rights
This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License.
APA Citation
Mooren, K., Smit, K., Engels, Y., Janssen, D., & Godschalx, J. (2022). “When I am breathless now, I don’t have the fear that’s linked to it.” A case series on the potential of EMDR to break the dyspnea-anxiety cycle in COPD. BMC Preprint. Open access: https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-1607925/v1
Audience
EMDR Therapists, Other Mental Health Professionals
Language
English
Content Type
Article, Peer-Reviewed
Access Type
External Resource, Open Access