The use of EMDR with refugees and asylum seekers: A review of research studies

Refugees and asylum seekers is a population exposed to life-changing events with multiple traumatic experiences and on-going stress. They are forced to leave their home countries to escape persecution and war. The majority of them are exposed to several traumatic events, such as the murder of family and friends, severe injury, and/or threat of death and torture, prior to their flight (de Jong et al. 2001, Mollica et al. 1999, Mollica et al. 2001).Our purpose is to analyse the efficacy of the EMDR with refugees and asylum seekers. This purpose is grounded on the characteristics of the traumatic symptoms of refugees: high rates of somatization were found among this population, so much so that this somatic symptomatology is considered in this particular clinical population a “primary” therapeutic target (Aragona et al. 2010). EMDR as a bottom up elaboration could be particularly useful to process these bodily symptoms. Scientific investigation of the effectiveness of EMDR to reduce psychological burden in refugees and asylum seekers is an important issue and is useful in determining whether to offer them this therapy. Other reviews deal with the different therapies used with these populations (e.g. Tribe, Sendt, & Tracy 2017), but we intend focus exclusively on the use of EMDR. Through this review we intend answer important questions on the use of EMDR for refugees and asylum seekers who live in very difficult circumstances and had experimented very severe and continuous trauma