About these standards

These standards apply whenever an Association member represents themselves as an IEMT Practitioner, Advanced Practitioner, Trainer or Supervisor. They sit alongside the Scope of Practice Policy, safeguarding arrangements, complaints procedures, membership standards and any law or professional code governing the member.

They are minimum Association requirements. Another regulator, employer, insurer or jurisdiction may impose a higher or more specific standard. The member must meet all applicable requirements.

Competence must be demonstrated through actual practice and decision-making. It must not be inferred from professional title, years in practice, testimonials, course attendance or confidence alone.

1. Knowledge and evidence literacy

Practitioners must be able to:

• describe the purpose and sequence of the IEMT procedures in which they were trained;
• explain emotional imprints, identity imprints and the Patterns of Chronicity as IEMT models or practitioner heuristics, not validated diagnoses or proven causes;
• state accurately that IEMT has a limited and emerging evidence base;
• distinguish practitioner observation, client report, case evidence, experimental research and controlled clinical evidence;
• avoid transferring evidence, mechanisms or guideline status from EMDR, exposure therapy, working-memory research or another intervention to IEMT; and
• update explanations and advertising when evidence or Association guidance changes.

See the Research and Articles hub and IEMT and EMDR comparison.

2. Scope, suitability and assessment

Practitioners must:

• work only where training, wider competence, insurance, supervision, law and other professional duties permit;
• identify the client’s goals, expectations, communication needs and reasons for seeking IEMT;
• screen for eye-movement concerns, current instability, safeguarding matters, immediate risk and other factors relevant to safe participation;
• recognise when more information, adaptation, medical guidance, coordination, supervision, referral or refusal is required;
• avoid using questionnaires or labels to imply diagnostic authority they do not hold; and
• review suitability throughout the work rather than treating intake as a one-off decision.

3. Technical delivery of IEMT

Practitioners must deliver the current authorised procedure accurately and be able to explain any deliberate adaptation. This includes:

• using clear, non-leading elicitation that obtains the client’s experience without supplying an interpretation;
• maintaining the specified sequence, timing, pace and directional precision of eye movements, including accurate K-pattern delivery where taught;
• maintaining a pace the client can track comfortably and checking visual comfort throughout;
• stopping when the client withdraws consent, loses tracking, becomes significantly distressed or reports pain, visual disturbance, dizziness, nausea or another concerning symptom;
• recording material deviations from the standard procedure and the reason for them; and
• using outcome checks that do not pressure the client to report improvement.

4. Consent and client participation

• Explain qualifications, role, evidence limits, proposed process, foreseeable discomfort, alternatives, fees, confidentiality and complaints before work begins.
• Check understanding and provide reasonable opportunities for questions.
• Obtain consent for the proposed work and renew it when the plan changes.
• Respect the right to pause, decline a question, refuse any procedure, withdraw consent or end the session.
• Do not use authority, urgency, group pressure, interpretation or financial leverage to secure participation.
• Where capacity or legal consent is uncertain, do not proceed until applicable requirements are understood and met.

5. Risk, safeguarding and referral

• Recognise when immediate safety, urgent healthcare or safeguarding action takes priority over IEMT.
• Use local emergency and safeguarding pathways rather than attempting to manage a crisis through IEMT.
• Seek consent for professional coordination where it is necessary and safe to do so, while recognising that law or protection of life may provide a different basis for limited disclosure.
• Refer or signpost without claiming that another professional has accepted responsibility until this is confirmed.
• Document the information considered, advice sought, decision made and follow-up arranged.
• Seek supervision when work approaches the edge of competence or when risk, boundaries or ethical duties are unclear.

Safeguarding information and contacts.

6. Communication, inclusion and accessibility

• Communicate plainly and avoid jargon, unnecessary certainty and pathologising language.
• Listen for the client’s own language and meaning rather than imposing the practitioner’s model.
• Consider disability, neurodivergence, culture, religion, language, literacy, age, gender, sexuality and social context without stereotyping.
• Make reasonable adjustments within competence and explain when an adjustment would materially change or prevent the proposed procedure.
• Use a competent interpreter where needed and address confidentiality and consent before the session.
• Challenge discrimination and avoid conversion, coercive or humiliating practices.

7. Records, confidentiality and data protection

• Create timely, factual and proportionate records of consent, suitability, work undertaken, outcomes, decisions, referrals and significant events.
• Separate client report, practitioner observation and practitioner interpretation.
• Correct material errors without obscuring the original record or audit trail.
• Collect only necessary information, use an appropriate lawful basis and provide a privacy notice.
• Store and transmit data securely, restrict access and use a justified retention schedule.
• Explain confidentiality limits and record any disclosure, its lawful basis and what was shared.
• Respond appropriately to lawful access, correction, restriction or deletion requests.

8. Remote and digital practice

• Confirm that insurance, competence and the laws of both practitioner and client locations permit remote work.
• Use secure, reliable technology and explain relevant privacy limitations.
• Agree what will happen if the connection fails, the client becomes distressed or privacy is interrupted.
• Consider screen size, camera position, lighting, latency and visual tracking before directed eye movements.
• Do not continue when the practitioner cannot observe tracking adequately or the client cannot follow safely.
• Collect location or emergency-contact information only where necessary, proportionate, lawful and explained.

9. Professional relationships and boundaries

• Maintain clear roles, contracts, fees, availability and contact arrangements.
• Avoid exploitation, sexual or romantic relationships with current clients, and other relationships that impair judgment or create foreseeable harm.
• Identify and manage conflicts of interest, gifts, financial incentives and dual relationships.
• Do not provide individual therapeutic advice in public comments or private social-media exchanges outside an agreed professional service.
• Protect confidentiality online and do not assume that removing a name makes a case unidentifiable.
• Represent membership, certification, testimonials and other qualifications accurately.

10. Outcomes, non-response and duty of candour

• Agree meaningful goals and review them without leading the client toward a positive answer.
• Recognise no change, mixed change and deterioration as legitimate outcomes.
• Do not explain non-response as resistance, lack of commitment or a chronicity pattern without evidence.
• Tell the client promptly when something has gone wrong, explain what is known, apologise where appropriate and record the response.
• Report adverse events and cooperate with review, learning and remediation.
• Do not alter records, discourage complaints or use confidentiality language to prevent lawful reporting.

Complaints, feedback and adverse-event reporting.

11. Supervision and continuing professional development

• Engage in regular supervision proportionate to experience, workload, client group, risk and complexity.
• Use supervision for reflection, ethical reasoning, competence limits, risk, technical fidelity and the effect of personal responses on practice.
• Maintain evidence of supervision without creating unnecessary duplicate client records.
• Complete at least 30 hours of relevant CPD each membership year unless a later published Association requirement replaces this figure.
• Choose CPD in response to identified needs rather than relying only on preferred topics.
• Undertake refresher or supervised practice after a substantial break, a competence concern or significant technical change.

12. Fitness to practise and professional standing

• Monitor physical health, mental health, fatigue, substance use, workload and personal circumstances that may affect safe practice.
• Seek appropriate help and reduce, adapt or stop work when judgment or delivery may be impaired.
• Maintain required insurance, licences, registrations and right to practise.
• Notify the Association promptly of restrictions, disciplinary findings, criminal matters or other information relevant to public protection, subject to applicable procedure.
• Cooperate honestly with complaints, audits, supervision requirements and competence reviews.

Competence concerns and remediation

Where competence is uncertain or falls below these standards, the Association or British Board may require evidence, supervision, restricted practice, further training, assessment or a period away from practice. Serious or repeated concerns may lead to interim measures, suspension, removal from the register or certification action under the relevant procedure.

Remediation is not a substitute for immediate public-protection action where risk requires it.

Commitment declaration

By maintaining Association practitioner status, members affirm that they will work within competence, follow current IEMT technical guidance, disclose limitations honestly, protect client welfare and seek help before difficulty becomes harm.

Approved by: The British Board for Integral Eye Movement Therapy. These standards do not imply statutory regulation or Professional Standards Authority accreditation.