Hypnotherapy in the news

“Professor David Spiegel, of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University, wants the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) to sanction sweeping changes.

He will tell the Royal Society of Medicine on Monday that Nice should add hypnotherapy to its list of approved therapeutic techniques for the treatment of conditions ranging from allergies and high blood pressure to the pain associated with cancer treatment and bone marrow transplantation.”

Please follow this link to the article :
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/5468518/British-surgeons-should-hypnotise-patients-for-some-operations-says-academic.html

New Stop Smoking research

Source: Medscape Medical News



Hypnotherapy Outperforms Other Treatment Approaches for Smoking Cessation CME



October 23, 2007 (Chicago) - Of hospitalized smokers who receive hypnotherapy, 50% show sustained quit rates 6 months after discharge, investigators reported here at CHEST 2007, the American College of Chest Physicians 73rd Annual Scientific Assembly.



This is twice the success rate of smokers who quit "cold turkey," which is even higher than the sustained quit rate with nicotine replacement therapy (NRT), principal investigator Faysal M. Hasan, MD, of North Shore Medical Center in Salem, Massachusetts, reported yesterday during a news briefing.



Dr. Hasan and colleagues studied 67 patients admitted to their institution with a cardiopulmonary diagnosis and a willingness to stop smoking. Patients were divided into 4 groups. The control group quit smoking without any supportive treatment, a second group underwent hypnotherapy, a third group received NRT, and the fourth group received both hypnotherapy and NRT.



Patients selected their own treatment approach, which Dr. Hasan explained was strongly influenced by their previous experiences with smoking cessation, with most patients choosing a different method.



Women were more likely to choose hypnotherapy, whereas men were more likely to choose a patch or go cold turkey. The men were looking for the "quick fix," news panel moderator Frank T. Leone, MD, of the University of Pennsylvania Health System in Pittsburgh, commented.



At 26 weeks postdischarge from the hospital, 25% of the control group, 15.78% of the NRT group, and 50% of both the hypnotherapy and hypnotherapy-plus-NRT groups remained smoking free.



"Adding NRT did not help" improve efficacy of hypnotherapy, Dr. Hasan said.



Dr. Hasan told Medscape Pulmonary Medicine that motivation is the key to success in any treatment approach: "Patients made their own [treatment] choice - this is important," he said. "Smoking cessation is only going to work if the patient is motivated."

Hypnosis and bowel inflammation

Hypnosis therapy may help ease some of the bowel inflammation seen in ulcerative colitis, a small study suggests.

Ulcerative colitis is a disease that causes chronic inflammation in the lining of the colon and rectum, leading to symptoms such as abdominal pain and diarrhea. There a number of medications for the disorder, but there is some research to suggest that hypnosis could serve as an additional therapy.

For example, "hypnotherapy" has been shown to aid irritable bowel syndrome and ulcers -- conditions that, like colitis, involve inflammation and can be worsened by psychological stress.

For the current study, UK researchers had 17 patients with active ulcerative colitis undergo a 50-minute session of "gut-focused" hypnotherapy aimed at relaxation and relief of inflammation. Another eight patients, who acted as a "control" group, listened to their choice of music for 50 minutes.


Afterward, the researchers found, blood levels of IL-6 -- a marker of inflammation in the body -- fell by 53 percent in the hypnosis group, whereas music listeners showed no substantial change.

Similarly, certain other chemical markers of inflammation declined in the hypnosis group, but not in the control group, the investigators report in the American Journal of Gastroenterology.

"This work shows that a single short session of hypnosis can return some of the chemical changes in the bowel associated with inflammation back towards normal in patients with ulcerative colitis," senior researcher Dr. David S. Rampton, of Barts and the London, Queen Mary School of Medicine and Dentistry, told Reuters Health.

Exactly why hypnosis might ease inflammation is not clear. According to Rampton's team, the therapy might have direct effects on colon activity or it might affect people's pain tolerance or perceptions of their symptoms.

The current findings, Rampton said, provide "a scientific basis for a properly designed clinical trial" to see whether hypnotherapy, given over weeks or months, might benefit people with ulcerative colitis.

He noted that it could also be worthwhile to study hypnosis for people with Crohn's disease, another form of inflammatory bowel disease.

SOURCE: American Journal of Gastroenterology, June 2008

More good news on smoking cessation

Hypnotherapy as an aid to smoking cessation of hospitalized patients: preliminary results

AUTHOR(S): Hasan FM, Pischke, K, Saiyed S, Macys D and McCleary

NDATE: Oct 2007

DESIGN: Self-selected trial

SUBJECTS: 67 patients admitted with a cardiopulmonary diagnosis

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the efficacy of hypnosis in smoking cessation in hospitalised patients.

INTERVENTIONS: Subjects contemplating quitting were recruited into 4 groups: Control subjects who preferred to quit "cold turkey" (C), hypnotherapy alone (H), Nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) and both hypnotherapy and NRT (NRTH). Subjects were allowed to self select their group. All subjects received self-help brochures. Control subjects received brief counselling, but other groups received intensive counselling, free supply of NRT and/or a free hypnotherapy session within 7 days of discharge. These groups also had follow up telephone calls at 1, 2, 4, 8, 12 and 26 weeks after discharge. Point prevalence rates for smoking were compared among the four groups at 26 weeks.

RESULTS: At 26 weeks after discharge, 4/12 of control subjects (25.0%), 7/14 in H (50.0%), 3/19 in NRT (15.78%) and 9/18 in NRTH (50%.0) groups were non-smokers. Patients admitted with a cardiac diagnosis were more like to quit at 26 weeks (45.5%) than patients admitted with a pulmonary diagnosis (15.63%).

CONCLUSIONS: Hypnotherapy after hospital discharge can be an effective mode of smoking cessation, comparing favourably with NRT alone.

SOURCE: Chest 2007 132: 52

New website

I have created a new website concentrating on my main areas of work.

Please visit it here http://www.squidoo.com/hypnosis-london

One Session ?

Many people believe that it has to take a long time to solve a problem - not me !

Over the years I have found that real changes can happen in only a single session of hypnosis - witness the exraordinary success of single session hypnotherapy to stop smoking, for example.

The power of expectation has been written about by all walks of therapists and I know that if you want and truly expect to change and if the therapist shares this belief too the wonderful things can and will happen.

In 2008 I expect to see many more clients who are ready and primed for change - hypnosis is merely the catalyst helping to make that happen.

A London Hypnotherapist's review of 2007

Looking back over 2007 one thing I have noticed is how hypnosis for weight loss has been less in demand than ever before.

Stop smoking has been stable despite a fall in demand when the UK smoking ban came to offices, pubs etc . I assume many people have just stopped of their own accord simply because it is now so hard to find somewhere to smoke - it's even banned in the home sometimes !

One thing that has increased is the amount of people wanting to overcome fears and build confidence - I wonder if this trend will continue in 2008 ?