Remembering Trauma to Beat Anxiety

Ivanhoe Newswire
Wednesday, February 28, 2007; 12:00 AM

By Lucy Williams, Ivanhoe Health Correspondent

ORLANDO, Fla. (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a potentially devastating anxiety disorder caused by exposure to traumatic events like combat, rape, assault and disaster. But prolonged exposure therapy could help trauma patients overcome a painful past.

People who suffer from PTSD may re-experience traumatic events, avoid reminders of the event, feel emotionally numb, or exhibit unnecessary outbursts of anger.

Patients who recall their trauma are more likely to overcome PTSD, according to recent research. With prolonged exposure therapy, patients vividly recount a traumatic event until they can confront their past with less emotional response.

"It's requested the patient shut his or her eyes to rule out distractions and remember the sights, the smells, the feelings, as well as possible," Paula P. Schnurr, Ph.D., of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) National Center for PTSD in White River Junction, Vt., and Dartmouth Medical School in Lebanon, N.H., told Ivanhoe.

Researchers report prolonged exposure therapy is a more effective PTSD treatment than present-centered therapy. In present-centered therapy, patients and counselors discuss and review daily difficulties associated with PTSD.

"The theory is that a traumatic event, the way it's represented in the memory, in the thoughts and the feelings, is best addressed through the techniques of exposure," said Dr. Schnurr. "By repetitively going through the traumatic material, feeling the feelings again, thinking the thoughts again ... Learning that it's no longer as frightening as it once was and that it's no longer dangerous."

In a randomized controlled trial of female veterans with PTSD, participants received either prolonged exposure or present-centered therapy, delivered in weekly, 90-minute sessions for 10 weeks. Women who received prolonged exposure experienced a greater reduction of PTSD symptoms compared to women who received present-centered therapy.