Tuesday 8 May 2012

Hypnotherapy in the news

Hypnotherapy allows patients to manage their pain, claims psychiatrist  


Speaking to the Wall Street Journal's Health Journal, director of the Center for Health and Stress at Stanford University Dr David Spiegel explained that hypnosis allows people to become completely absorbed, much in the same way as they might do while reading a book.

The psychiatrist, who has 40 years of experience, said: "We can teach people how to manage pain and anxiety. There has been this mistake in medicine that if you have a certain amount of tissue damage, you should feel this amount of pain. But many things can alter how much pain you feel."

New York psychologist Dr Jeanne Safer told the same resource that using hypnotherapy to combat her leukaemia lets her feel more comfortable before examinations and surgery, despite starting out as a sceptic.

Among the most recent medical evidence to support this type of therapy was published by researchers in Sweden this month; a team from the Sahlgrenska Academy of the University of Gothenburg found that hypnotherapists can provide lasting relief for sufferers of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), reported Huff Post Lifestyle.

Magnus Simren, the author of the study, explained that the "deep relaxation and individually adapted hypnotic suggestions" were found to reduce people's IBS symptoms.