As anyone who has gone for a walk to ease a troubled mind knows, there's something about motion that helps process distressing memories.
Now, University of Alberta researchers have solid evidence that an innovative psychotherapy is an effective treatment for PTSD.
Known as Multi-modal Motion-assisted Memory Desensitization and Reconsolidation - or 3MDR - the therapy involves patients walking on a treadmill while being briefly exposed to self-selected images and music reminding them of past trauma. 3MDR has shown enormous promise since it was first developed in the Netherlands about 15 years ago.
"We have seen remarkable results," says Dr. Phillip Sevigny of the Faculty of Education, who is a co-leadof the study along with Dr. Suzette Brémault-Phillips, a professor in the Faculty of Rehabilitation Medicine.
"We see gains in weeks that might take years otherwise, and people get better and stay better for at least one year," says Sevigny.
"This is one of the most promising interventions that I have ever worked with as a clinician over decades. It empowers people and gives them absolute control over their processing journey," says Brémault-Phillips.
Even a few sessions of 3MDR can begin transforming debilitating trauma into manageable memories.
"There is something about walking that allows people to think differently - what we call divergent thinking. Rather than being stuck in either a frozen or fight-or-flight mode while experiencing distress related to PTSD, it allows them to move in the direction of processing," she says.
Through the Heroes in Mind, Advocacy & Research Consortium (HiMARC), Brémault-Phillips and Sevigny run the only clinical research program of its kind in Canada. It began in 2019 treating those most affected by PTSD - such as military members, veterans, first responders, public safety personnel, and healthcare workers - but has since expanded to civilian populations. More than 200 Albertans have received 3MDR.
The results are so striking, say the researchers, that they have "a moral imperative to distribute 3MDR as widely as we possibly can," adding they are now in talks to make the therapy available to other populations, including Indigenous communities to address intergenerational trauma.
