Sirin Haciomeroglu Atceken, MFT, is a marriage and family therapist. She received her bachelor’s degree from the Middle East Technical University (METU) Psychology Department and her master’s degree from Drexel University’s Marriage and Family Therapy Program. After graduation, she worked with families and individuals at Thomas Jefferson Hospital’s Methadone Clinic and Family Therapy Treatment Program—PHMC in Philadelphia. She is currently cofounder of the Salt Psychology Institute in Antalya, Turkey. Apart from using eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) as a frequent therapy approach, she has been working in research and projects about EMDR’s usage in various cases and problem areas and integration into other psychotherapy approaches. Her areas of expertise include chronic headache, performance improvement, addictions, attachment disorders, early trauma intervention, and anxiety disorders. She is a board member of EMDR Turkey Association and an EMDR Europe–approved consultant and supervisor. She has also worked as a member of the EMDR Humanitarian Assistance Program (HAP) in different trauma-related situations in Turkey and Holland.
Paula Baldomir Gago, MS, MC, CP, is a psychologist and psychotherapist. Since 2008, she has worked as an expert in personality disorders, trauma, and dissociation at the Institute for the Research and Treatment of Trauma and Personality Disorders (INTRA-TP). Paula is an expert in childhood and adolescent psychopathology as well as psychosomatic medicine. She is an accredited EMDR practitioner for adults, children, and adolescents. Paula collaborates with the Gender Violence Program in her community, serving both female victims and their children. She has offered different training courses for professionals in the network of educational and youth centers in her community, as well as talks and presentations in different cities on working with children and adolescents with complex trauma.
Renée Beer, MSc, is a clinical psychologist and cognitive behavioral therapist. She is an EMDR Europe–accredited trainer for EMDR with children and adolescents, and has been involved in trainings in the Netherlands since 2000. She participated in the Child & Adolescent Committee of EMDR Europe from the start until 2017. Abroad, she delivered trainings on “EMDR With Children and Adolescents” in Suriname and Australia. She specialized in the treatment of eating disorders at the Department of Child Psychiatry of the University Medical Center in Utrecht from 2000 to 2005. She and Karin Tobias developed a protocol for cognitive behavioral therapy for adolescents, based on the theoretical model of Fairburn (2003), which they published in 2011. She was coordinator of the Center for Trauma and Family in Amsterdam from 2005 to 2013. Together with Carlijn de Roos, she edited the Handbook of EMDR With Children and Adolescents in 2017. Besides her EMDR activities, she is accredited as a trainer in trauma-focused cognitive behavioral therapy (TFCBT). Her major concerns are to establish both EMDR and TFCBT in the Netherlands as the major therapy approaches for the treatment of trauma-related psychopathology in children and adolescents and to promote the implementation of cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and EMDR in the treatment of patients (adults and adolescents) with an eating disorder.
Wolfgang Eich, MD, is specialized in internal medicine and rheumatology as well as in psychotherapeutic medicine and psychoanalysis. After studying medicine in Tübingen and Freiburg, Germany, he published his medical dissertation in 1980 on the topic “Medical Semiotics Between 1750 and 1850” (summa cum laude). He continued his studies of internal and psychotherapeutic medicine in Hanover and Heidelberg. In 1994, he completed his postdoctoral qualification at the Medical Faculty of Heidelberg University on “Subjective Illness and Self-Regulatory Control in Ankylosing Spondylitis (M. Bechterew).” In 2002, he was appointed to be medical director of the Acura-Clinic for Psychosomatic Medicine Baden-Baden within the framework of a cooperation agreement between the Medical Faculty, the Medical University Hospital, and the Center of Rheumatology in Baden-Baden. Since 2004, he is a full professor of integrated psychosomatics and head of the Section of Integrated Medicine at the Medical University of Heidelberg. He is the head of numerous research projects on shared decision making and on chronic pain (most recently, he was the coordinator of the LOGIN (Localized and Generalized Musculoskeletal Pain: Psychobiological Mechanisms and Implications for Treatment) consortium and the principal investigator of LOGIN’s subproject 6: Subgroups characterized by psychological trauma, mental comorbidity, and psychobiological patterns and their specialized treatment funded by the German Ministry of Research and Education. Within this framework, numerous publications on EMDR and chronic pain followed.
Ana Cris Eiriz, MS, MC, LSW, CP, is a psychologist and psychotherapist specializing in trauma, personality disorders, mood disorders, and dissociation. She is an accredited systemic family therapist and an accredited EMDR practitioner. She has been working in the INTRA-TP team since 2004. She is an expert in personality disorders, trauma, and affective disorders. She collaborates with two gender violence programs in her community, one for women who are victims of violence and one for men with anger issues. Ana Cris has published two books on bipolar disorder and several articles on personality disorders and trauma. Ana has presented many psychoeducational workshops on personality disorders at different associations directed at patients and their families. She teaches about personality disorders, trauma, and family interventions to clinicians and regularly supervises the work of other professionals.
Hejan Epözdemir, PhD, is a clinical psychologist and psychotherapist working and living in Istanbul. She studied psychology and later graduated in clinical psychology, receiving her doctoral degree from Hacettepe University Department of Clinical Psychology. Dr. Epözdemir has her own private clinical practice working with adults, couples, and families and also works part-time as faculty and clinical supervisor in both Istanbul Bilgi University and Bahcesehir University. She was a founding member of the Board for EMDR Turkey and is an accredited EMDR consultant and supervisor and an editor of EMDR Turkey Bulletin. She is also interested in research and has had several academic studies, including academic texts, articles, and presentations in both national and international publications, journals, and conferences.
Raquel Fernández Domínguez, LSW, is a social care worker and licensed pedagogue. She has worked as an expert in personality disorders, trauma, and dissociation at the INTRA-TP since 2008. Raquel has specific training in attachment, trauma, and dissociation. She has more than 8 years of experience working with families of severely traumatized children as well as families of people with personality disorders. She has offered different training courses for professionals in the network of educational and youth centers in her community, as well as talks and presentations in different cities on working with children and adolescents with complex trauma. She has also been a speaker at workshops for professionals on the treatment of borderline personality disorder, as well as doing talks and workshops for relatives of people with personality disorders in different cities in Spain.
Carol Forgash, LCSW, BCD, was a president of and on the board of the EMDR HAPs. She has a clinical and consulting practice in Smithtown, New York. She is a facilitator and an EMDR International Association (EMDRIA)-approved consultant. She is a lecturer and consultant on the treatment of dissociation, complex posttraumatic stress disorders, the complex health issues of sexual abuse survivors, and the integration of EMDR with ego state therapy and psychodynamic treatment. She has coauthored and edited Healing the Heart of Trauma and Dissociation With EMDR and Ego State Therapy (Springer Publishing, 2007), the first book to offer an integrative approach to successfully treating clients with the most severe trauma-related disorders.
Önder Kavakçı, MD, is a psychiatrist and psychotherapist specializing in the areas of trauma, anxiety disorders, and pregnancy-related disorders. He is an associate professor at the Medical School of Cumhuriyet University. He is a member of EMDR-Turkey (EMDR-TR). He is president of the Research and Publishing Committees of EMDR Turkey and has been actively working with the Turkish Psychiatry Association Trauma and Disaster Committees. He is the author of the first Turkish EMDR book, EMDR for Psychological Trauma (Ruhsal Travma Tedavisi İçin EMDR).
Jim Knipe, PhD, has been using EMDR since 1992. He is an EMDR HAP trainer and an EMDRIA-approved consultant and instructor, and was designated a “Master Clinician” by EMDRIA in 2007. He has been an invited speaker at national EMDR conferences in 14 countries in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Asia, and he has been involved since 1995 with the Trauma Recovery/EMDR Humanitarian Assistance organization, coordinating EMDR training programs in developing countries where significant trauma has occurred. He is a coauthor of a published outcome research documenting the effects of EMDR with survivors of the New York 9/11 terrorist attack and with those traumatized by the 1999 Marmara earthquake in Turkey. Dr. Knipe has contributed chapters to EMDR Casebook (2002); EMDR Solutions, Volumes I and II (2005, 2009); Healing the Heart of Trauma and Dissociation (2007); EMDR Scripted Protocols: Special Populations (2009); and EMDR and Dissociation (2012). His book EMDR Toolbox: Theory and Treatment for Complex PTSD and Dissociation was published in August 2014, and he is a coauthor (with Dolores Mosquera) of two recent articles in the Journal of EMDR Practice and Research, entitled “Understanding and Treating Narcissism With EMDR Therapy” (Winter, 2015) and “Idealization and Maladaptive Positive Responses: EMDR Therapy for Women Who Are Ambivalent About Leaving an Abusive Partner” (Winter, 2017). An online streaming video of his two-day training—EMDR-related methods of treating complex PTSD and dissociation—is available through Trauma Recovery/HAP (www.emdrhap.org).
Emre Konuk, MA, is a clinical psychologist. He received his undergraduate degree at Istanbul University, followed by a graduate degree in clinical psychology at Bogazici University. He received his family therapy training at the Mental Research Institute, Brief Therapy Center, Palo Alto. He became a pioneer in Turkey establishing psychotherapy as a profession by founding the Institute for Behavioral Studies (DBE, Davranış Bilimleri Enstitüsü) in 1985, with the vision of providing psychological services to individuals, couples, and families. In 1998, he established the Organizational Development Center in order to contribute to the improvement and growth of organizations and human resources. He is an EMDR Institute and EMDR Europe trainer, president of the Institute for Behavioral Studies–Istanbul, president of EMDR Association and EMDR HAP–Turkey, and general secretary of Couples and Family Therapy Association–Turkey. He was a board member for the Turkish Psychologists Association, Istanbul Branch, between 1990 and 2002, and president and projects coordinator between 1998 and 2002. At present, he is a member of the Ethics Committee for the Turkish Psychologists Association. Since the 1999 Marmara earthquake, he has been responsible for EMDR HAP and EMDR basic trainings in Turkey. More than 600 professionals have been trained during EMDR and several HAP projects. He has participated in EMDR HAP projects in Thailand, Palestine, Kenya, Lebanon, and Iraq. His major concern is to establish EMDR as a major therapy approach in Turkey.
Dolores Mosquera, MS, MC, CP, is a psychologist and psychotherapist specializing in severe and complex trauma, personality disorders, and dissociation. She is an accredited EMDR Europe trainer and supervisor. Dolores is the director of the INTRA-TP in A Coruña, Spain—a three-clinic private institution initially founded in 2000 as LOGPSIC. She collaborates with two different domestic violence (DV) programs, one focused on women victims of DV and another one on males with violent behavior. She belongs to the Spanish National Network for the Assistance of Victims of Terrorism and also collaborates with an organization aiding victims of emergencies, accidents, violent attacks, kidnapping, and other traumatic incidents. Dolores has extensive teaching experience, leading seminars, workshops, and lectures internationally. She has participated as a guest speaker in numerous conferences and workshops throughout Europe, Asia, Australia, and North, Central, and South America. She has published 15 books and numerous articles on personality disorders, complex trauma, and dissociation, and is a recognized expert in this field. She also teaches in several universities and collaborates supervising clinical psychologists in postgraduate training programs in Spain. She is coauthor of the books EMDR and Dissociation, The Progressive Approach, and EMDR Therapy and Borderline Personality Disorder. Dolores received the David Servan-Schreiber award for outstanding contribution to EMDR in 2017 from the EMDR Europe Association.
Marco Pagani, MD, PhD, received his MD in 1985 and his PhD in Brain Neurophysiology and Nuclear Medicine Methodology in 2000 from the Karolinska Institute of Stockholm. He is a Senior Researcher at the Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies of the Italian National Research Council. His work focuses on the pathophysiology of neurological and psychiatric disorders as investigated by neuroimaging methodologies. In these fields, he has published more than 130 full papers, more than 30 of which are on PTSD and EDMR. In 2011, he was awarded the Francine Shapiro Award from EMDR-Europe for the best 2010 scientific contribution in EMDR for the paper, Grey Matter Changes in Posterior Cingulate and lLmbic Cortex in PTSD Are Associated with Trauma Load and EMDR Outcome. He was presented with an Italian award for his work on PTSD and EMDR.
Livia Sani, MS, is a clinical psychologist. She graduated from La Sapienza University in Rome, specializing in psychotraumatology and emergency psychology at Lumsa University, Rome. She conducted research on PTSD as a research assistant at Vrije University in Amsterdam and collaborated with the Institute of Cognitive Sciences and Technologies in Rome. She is currently finishing her PhD in clinical psychology at the University of Strasbourg, France. Her work is focused on perinatal death and the long-term psychological consequences of parents.
Günter H. Seidler, MD, was head of the Department of Psychotraumatology at the Center for Psychosocial Medicine of the Heidelberg University Hospital from 2002 until his retirement in summer 2015. He began his career as a neurosurgeon and is now working on a freelance basis as an author, coach, consultant, training therapist, and supervisor. He is a medical specialist in neurology and psychiatry as well as in psychosomatic medicine and psychotherapy. Moreover, he is a training analyst, a group training analyst, and a certified EMDR supervisor. The preliminary draft of his first book (In Others’ Eyes: An Analysis of Shame; Madison: International Universities Press, 2000) was given the sponsorship award of the German Psychoanalytic Society in 1989. The empirical examination of this construct, which he developed and explored in his postdoctoral qualification thesis (“Inpatient Psychotherapy on the Test Bench: Inter-subjectivity and Health Improvement,” 1999), was awarded the “Research Prize for Psychotherapy in Medicine.” His findings led him to a paradigm shift, and he turned to psychotraumatology. He is founder and chief editor of the journal Trauma & Violence and of the Handbook of Psychotraumatology. He has carried out numerous scientific projects on the consequences of individual violence and large-scale disasters as well as on the development of novel psychotherapeutical approaches. He is internationally regarded as one of the leading psychiatric therapists. In his practical work, he combines a scientific orientation with his own therapeutic approaches based on extensive competence in numerous established therapeutic procedures.
Natalia Seijo, PhD, is a psychologist and psychotherapist who specializes in eating disorders, dissociation, and complex trauma. She is the director of an outpatient clinic, which she founded 20 years ago in A Coruña, Spain. She is an EMDR Europe consultant and facilitator for the EMDR Institute. She developed her expertise on eating disorders in one of the most important eating disorders units in Spain. She is currently developing her doctoral thesis on the “Prevalence of Dissociation in Outpatients in Spain” and is also researching eating disorders with several different projects. She teaches EMDR and eating disorders workshops for the Spanish EMDR Association and is a presenter at various international conferences, and also gives workshops on eating disorders. Her publications in the eating disorders field link trauma, attachment, and dissociation. She collaborates with several universities in Spain with programs to train students on the clinical aspects of therapy and is a teacher for the EMDR Master’s Program at UNED University in Spain on eating disorders.
Jonas Tesarz, MD, is a specialist in internal medicine and is working as a medical doctor and clinical researcher at the Heidelberg University Hospital, Department of General Internal Medicine and Psychosomatics. After completing his doctor’s degree at the Heidelberg University on the neurobiology of pain processing, he focused his scientific work on the investigation of the role of myofascial tissue in the development and maintenance of low-back pain, before he started working as a medical assistant at the Department of General Internal Medicine and Psychosomatics (Section for Musculoskeletal Pain) at the University of Heidelberg. There, he worked on the relationship between biopsychosocial factors and low-back pain. Since that time, he has focused on the modulation of pain perception by psychosocial factors. In addition to researching the influence of traumatizing life events on pain processing, his particular scientific interest lies in the development and scientific evaluation of EMDR in the treatment of chronic pain syndromes. Tesarz has been researching and publishing internationally in the field of pain research for many years. He is the principal investigator of the first randomized controlled trial on EMDR in chronic back pain patients, writer of the German reference book Pain Treatment With EMDR, and author of numerous scientific publications on EMDR in pain therapy. In 2015, he received the “German Award for Pain Research” for his work on the influence of psychological trauma on pain.
Asena Yurtsever, MA, clinical psychologist and psychodramatist, graduated and completed her master’s degree from İstanbul University. She specializes in EMDR, family therapy, expressive arts therapy, and psychodrama and works with adults and adolescents. Ms. Yurtsever is an EMDR Europe–accredited trainer, consultant, and supervisor. She gives EMDR trainings in Turkey. She supports EMDR Trauma Aid locally and internationally. She worked with Syrian refugees, and at the Atatürk airport explosion, the Beşiktaş explosion, and the Soma mine disaster in Turkey. She is also a part of establishing EMDR basic trainings in Northern Iraq with EMDR Trauma Aid Europe. She gas trained participants in Lebanon (2015) and Germany (2016) with EMDR R-TEP and EMDR G-TEP trainings.
Maria Zaccagnino, PhD, is a clinical psychologist and psychotherapist with a cognitive evolutionary approach. She is co-director of the Center of EMDR Therapy for Eating Disorders in Milan with Dr. Isabel Fernandez. She is an EMDR Europe–approved supervisor and facilitator and she works in the field of attachment theory and eating disorders, where she has achieved remarkable results in both clinical and research contexts. She coordinates much research concerning these areas of EMDR application for the Italian EMDR Association, and she has also presented workshops in Italy and Europe. She has published articles regarding the application of EMDR treatment in the context of parenting problems, attachment dynamics, and eating disorders.
Zeynep Zat, MSc, is a psychologist and psychotherapist specializing in the areas of trauma and anxiety disorders. She had been working for the National Health Service at the Psychodynamic Psychotrauma Institute in London. She is an EMDR practitioner and a member of EMDR-TR. She has been actively working on the Research, Clinical Applications, and Protocol Committees. Her roles in these committees include writing an EMDR-TR newsletter and translating an EMDR book into Turkish. She also gives workshops on using EMDR with different populations. She has recently developed a protocol on the “Treatment of Panic Disorder With EMDR.” A version of the protocol, which is integrated with Strategic Family Therapy, was presented at the last International Family Therapy Association Conference. Currently, she works at the Institute for Behavioral Studies in Istanbul.
