NCT06493708

Effectiveness of EMDR in Borderline Personality Disorder

Effectiveness of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) Applied to Borderline Personality Disorder: an Interventional Prospective Case Control Study in a Real-world Care Setting

• Status: Recruiting
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 56 (estimated)
• Sponsor: Azienda Socio Sanitaria Territoriale degli Spedali Civili di Brescia · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years – 65 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a severe mental disorder characterized by four major symptomatological domains: interpersonal instability, perceptive and identity disorders, emotional and behavioural dysregulation. Considering a multifactorial etiological model, it has been suggested that the interaction between behavioral, environmental and genetic factors may promote the development of BPD. Early life stress events (ELS) in childhood and adolescence are highly prevalent in this population and constitute an environmental risk factor for the development of BPD. This correlates with the fact that Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is frequently comorbid in BPD leading to more severe symptoms and worse psychosocial functioning. At the therapeutic level, the treatment of BPD is an open challenge as psychotherapeutic interventions are of limited effectiveness and characterized by high drop-out rates. Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) is the gold standard for treating PTSD. However, scientific evidence on the application of EMDR in patients with BPD is limited. This study aims to assess the feasibility and effectiveness of an EMDR protocol on the nuclear symptomatology of BPD (emotional and behavioral dysregulation) in a group of DBP patients with/without PTSD comorbidity, through a systematic assessment of the peculiar dimensions of the disorder. The basic hypothesis is that EMDR, through a short-term intervention, can act both on the traumatic PTSD-like experiences reported by patients and on the clinical manifestations peculiar to DBP, in particular by improving the emotional regulation capacity of patients with BPD.

Conditions

• Borderline Personality Disorder

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Trauma focused psychotherapy: EMDR	14 sessions of psychotherapy with EMDR will be carried out with patients. One session per week, lasting 90 minutes. The first two sessions will be used for the description of the EMDR method and for stabilization, then there will be treatment sessions.

Timeline

• Start date: 2024-10-01
• Primary completion: 2026-05-31
• Completion: 2026-10-01
• First posted: 2024-07-10
• Last updated: 2026-02-25

Locations

1 site across 1 country: Italy