By: Frank Bourke, Ph.D.

Introduction to the RTM Protocol for PTSD of the Research and Recognition Project:

The Research and Recognition Project, a 501 3 C not for profit corporation, has just been awarded a $300,000 NYS Grant to conduct a pilot study on a treatment protocol for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Clinical results of the cognitive therapy style treatment are showing the removal of the nightmare, flashback and related emotional symptoms of PTSD in less than five hours of treatment. The protocol, Reconsolidation of Traumatic Memories (RTM), is named after newly researched neurological findings on traumatic memories (See this article by Byron Lewis for an overview). While its clinical administration resembles Cognitive Therapy, its efficacy is more a product of changes effected, during its administration, in the neurology of the traumatic memory than the conscious control achieved during traditional Cognitive/Behavior Therapy.

The award was based, in large part, on support from professionals at five Universities who have observed or used the protocol with veterans. If the research results substantiate the clinical observations, the protocol could save the government over 5 billion dollars in the next ten years, based on the recent Rand Report. More importantly, it would reverse the accrual of thousands of disabled veterans over the next twenty years and could provide substantial relief to the severely overburdened VA system. Professionals at the Research and Recognition Project caution that the RTM Protocol has no effect on the alcohol, drug, anxiety, depression, family and vocational problems that accrue in veterans coping with PTSD for extended periods of time. Given the size and scope of this nationally recognized problem, they are hoping to complete the studies necessary to bring the Protocol into widespread practice, on an accelerated schedule with the help of private Foundations and Veterans Organizations.

The R & R project was founded in 2008 to bring clinically effective mental health treatments through the research steps necessary to have them recognized as evidentiary medicine. Most of the materials come from a little known and professionally unrecognized field of mental health materials, called Neuro- Linguistic Programming (NLP). While the field has been under clinical development for thirty years, professional practitioners, here in the U.S, and in Europe, have only recently begun a research movement to validate the effective clinical materials the field contains. The research movement is evidenced by the founding of the bi-annual NLP Research Conference in 2008, the NLP Research Journal in 2010, and the Not for profit Research and Recognition Project (R & R) in 2007.

Members of the R & R Project developed a researchable version of a treatment protocol for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in 2009, as the first protocol to bring through the research and publication process to classification as evidentiary medicine. Since then it has trained Clinical University Professors in the protocols administration, and submitted University supported grant proposals for 28 million dollars to study the protocol. Additionally, it has developed, written and published the neurological underpinning of the protocol and published them in Traumatology Journal in the Fall of 2012 (Link to Article PDF). The development of the Reconsolidation of Traumatic Memories protocol represents the first serious attempt to bring an NLP derived treatment protocol through the research/publication sequence to recognition as evidentiary medicine.

Clinical Professionals from Marshall University, Ohio University, Syracuse University, Columbia University and Bradley University are involved (See Attestations here-PDF file). In 2012, the Project members edited and had published the first academically oriented book overviewing the field in Routledge Press’s Advances in Mental Health Research Series. The book is titled, “The Clinical Effectiveness of Neurolinguistic Programming, A Critical Appraisal”. Chapter Four overviews the materials related to PTSD.  (For more information about this book, follow this link.)

Clinically, the core of PTSD is usually a phobic response to a terrifying event that is relived (nightmares/flashbacks) in response to specific sensory triggers or during sleep. While clinical trials of the RTM Protocol are demonstrating clinical effectiveness with core PTSD symptoms, the associated symptoms that are often triggered by these same memories, frequently need clinical treatment before or after the administration of the RTM protocol to produce a complete clinical intervention. The problems being most encountered are grief/loss, self-blame (guilt, shame, regret, remorse), other-blame (anger, rage, resentment), anxiety, or disillusionment—the loss or revision of fundamental meanings about the self or the world. Additional researchable protocols dealing with these other problems have also been developed and will be researched as well.

The Research and Recognition Project, Inc. is an independent not-for-profit corporation. Hundreds of supporters are helping us do the job by coordinating resources and implementing well-designed plans to achieve the projects goals and objectives.

We invite you to explore this site, get to know us and the mission and goals of the Research & Recognition Project. Watch for updates, news, and additional content.

We need your help! Support us by making a donation or joining our mailing list (use the icons below) or by volunteering (use the link under “Get Involved” above). This is an important and timely project – help us keep moving forward!

A major goal of the Research & Recognition project has been to expand the scientific base of NLP and related technologies.  The R&R research team and others in the community have been working on writing a book critically examining the research that has been done, and setting out new directions.  This book has just been published by Routledge in there Advances in Mental Health Research series.

The publication of this book is a major accomplished toward the goal of the Research & Recognition Project, encouraging research in NLP and related technologies.

Follow this link to a full description of the book: The Clinical Effectiveness of Neurolinguistic Programming

Dr. Richard Gray, the director of the Research & Recognition Project Research Team, and Dr. Richard Liotta have had there paper published in the professional journal Traumatology.

The paper discusses the theoretical basis of the RTM (Reconsolidation of Traumatic Memories) protocal.  RTM is a standardized research protocal derived from what was originally called the Visual-Kinesthetic Dissociation (VKD) Protocol.

The paper can be found here.

Email that is being sent out to friends of NLP (12/4/2011). Just in case you did not receive it, here it is:

Dear Friend of NLP:

Want to know what’s really new in NLP? Here is the latest from the NLP Research and Recognition Project.

We can bring NLP into the news limelight NOW. Our 5-veteran pilot study of the Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) Treatment Protocol has had excellent results for our veterans. We believe the treatment protocol has the potential to become a standard treatment for military veterans with PTSD.

The US Veterans Affairs Department has stated that PTSD is the most common mental health problem among returning veterans, with 15% reporting symptoms. Already 197,074 vets have received treatment.

We need to extend the study to 30 veterans to publish the results this winter. This is a big step in getting NLP recognized for what it contributes to the health and well-being of many people. Media coverage of this publication will put NLP and this Research Project in the high-profile news immediately. (Check out the exciting story of the study – attached.)

If this 30-person research project proves successful in treating PTSD, this could very well gain NLP its first widespread “positive” public recognition. Imagine seeing and hearing that story on the evening news!

We have raised $30,000 so far and need another $70,000 to complete the study. We are now asking a number of veterans’ organizations and the NLP community world-wide for help.

So, please send $10, $50 or whatever you can….NOW. Your tax-deductible donation will make a difference. Go to http://www.NLPRandR.org to donate.

We are working hard to get NLP recognized!!! To see what we have done so far Go to this link, a page on this site.

All the best,

Frank Bourke, Ph. D and the Research Project Team.
Steve Andreas, Rich Liotta, Richard Gray, Lisa Wake, Bob Salluzzo,
E-mail: fpmc1000@hotmail.com Web: http://nlprandr.org

Shelle Rose Charvet and Michael Hall edited a brand new NLP book; Innovations in NLP for Challenging Times and it’s being launched in London, UK, at the NLP Conference on 11/19/2011. It is the first time such a collaboration between so many NLP experts, developers and authors has happened. All the contributor’s proceeds are being donated to the NLP Research and Recognition project.

Frank Bourke and Richard Liotta authored the chapter in the book on the NLP Research and Recognition Project.

David Bowman, of Crown House Publishing, announcing the launch of the book, wrote:

You are cordially invited to the launch of Innovations in NLP, a collaborative venture designed to bring together in one book some of the major new developments in NLP. All the contributors’ royalties from the book are being donated to the NLP Research and Recognition Project, a venture which is being conducted by Richard Liotta and Frank Bourke and which they talk about in their contribution to Innovations.

Since its launch in 2006, the Project has attracted increasing support, reflecting the widespread frustration felt both within and outside the NLP community at the lack of scientific research into and evidence for the effectiveness of NLP. Frank felt this frustration keenly himself in the aftermath of 9/11 when, in his own clinical practice, he helped many survivors using the NLP protocols for the treatment of PTSD but saw thousands of other survivors, being treated by other clinicians, who could have been helped in this way and were not. Frank’s is a fascinating story, moving from his own first encounter with NLP in the mid 70s and his realization that it was the largest advance in psychotherapy in 50 years, to having to abandon his research into the subject shortly afterwards and his reawakening to its power during his nine months of work with 9/11 survivors and his treatment of his own terminally-diagnosed case of cancer, in which he used his NLP tools for a year and a half to produce a recovery that was labelled, medically, ‘remarkable’. When he realized he had ‘survived’ the cancer and did a life re-evaluation Frank took an oath to do what he could to get NLP researched, recognized and used to its full capabilities. In discussions with other NLP leaders, especially Judith DeLozier and Steve Andreas, NLP R&R was born and he and Richard have been nurturing it ever since.

The launch is taking place during the Saturday (11/19/2011) evening drinks reception at the NLP Conference (5.45pm – 6.30pm) and many of the contributors will be there including Shelle Rose Charvet, Michael Hall, Charles Faulkner, Ian McDermott, James Lawley, Penny Tompkins, Martin Roberts, Nick Kemp, Lisa Wake, Karen Moxom and Patrick Merlevede. We are also delighted to welcome Kimiko Bokura-Shafé, Dr. Masaki Kono and Dr. Hiromi Tamaki from Japan who have written about their pioneering work with cancer patients.

Thank you for your support and we look forward to seeing you there.

Best Wishes,
David

An article about the Research and Recognition Project has been posted in the International Hypnosis Research Institute Blog.  The IHRI Blog has 90,000 subscribers.  The article can be viewed here: NLP Research & Recogntion Project article.  It was posted on the IHRI Blog on 9/18/2009.