The first task for many psychologists who use hypnosis is to explain to their patients what hypnosis is and is not.
“When you watch hypnosis on TV, the subject always ends up crowing like a chicken, stripping naked, or assassinating the president,” says the founder of Michigan Behavioral Consultants and former president of the APA division. says Dr. Eric Wilmers. 30 (Society of Psychological Hypnosis).
Even though on-stage hypnotists and TV shows have tarnished the public image of hypnosis, a growing body of scientific research supports the benefits of hypnosis in treating a wide range of conditions, including pain, depression, anxiety, and phobias. I am.
“Hypnosis works, and the empirical support for that is clear. It really helps people,” says Dr. Michael Yapko, a psychologist and fellow of the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis. “But hypnosis is not a therapy in itself. Most people would not think of hypnosis as such.”
Hypnosis can create a highly relaxed state of internal concentration and focused attention in patients, and this technique can be tailored to a variety of treatments, such as cognitive behavioral therapy. You can also help patients by learning how to hypnotize themselves at home to reduce chronic pain, improve sleep, and reduce some symptoms of depression and anxiety. can gain more power.
Hypnosis has been used for centuries to control pain. An example of this was during the Civil War, when Army surgeons hypnotized wounded soldiers before amputating them. Recent studies have confirmed its effectiveness as a pain relief tool. Among the leading researchers in this field is psychologist Guy H. Montgomery, Ph.D. He has conducted extensive research in hypnosis and pain management at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, where he is Director of the Integrative Behavioral Medicine Program.
In one study, Montgomery et al. tested the effectiveness of a 15-minute hypnosis session and empathic listening session before surgery in a clinical trial of 200 breast cancer patients.In a 2007 article in National Cancer Institute Journal (Vol. 99, No. 17), the research team reported that patients who received hypnosis had less pain, nausea, fatigue, and discomfort after surgery. The study also found that the hospital saved $772 per patient in the hypnosis group, primarily due to reduced surgical time. Hypnotized patients required less painkiller lidocaine and sedative propofol during surgery.
“Hypnosis can help patients feel less distressed and have positive expectations about the outcome of their surgery,” Montgomery says. “I don’t think magic or mind control exists.”
In a 2009 article health psychology (Vol. 28, No. 3), Montgomery et al. report on another study that found that a combination of hypnotherapy and cognitive behavioral therapy may reduce fatigue in breast cancer patients undergoing radiation therapy. Did.
Studies have also shown the benefits of hypnosis for burn patients. In the 2007 report: rehabilitation psychology Dr. Shelley Wiechman Askay, Dr. David R. Patterson, and colleagues at the University of Washington School of Medicine found that hypnotherapy before debridement significantly reduced pain reported by patients on a pain assessment questionnaire. discovered.
There is no panacea
People vary widely in their ability to respond to hypnotic suggestions, and this characteristic can be measured with standardized scales. However, the causes and significance of the different levels of “hypnosis” are not well understood.
Yapko said few clinicians use measures of hypnotic effectiveness because responses to structured tests cannot predict how a patient will respond to hypnosis during treatment. He served as guest editor for a recent special issue of the magazine. International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis (Vol. 58, No. 2) reviewed research on hypnosis and depression. In his editorial, Yapko called for more research and a rejection of the outdated view that hypnosis can induce suicide or psychosis in depressed patients. Other articles have considered how hypnosis can be integrated with cognitive behavioral therapy and used with patients with depression and their families.
Wilmars said he doesn’t always use the hypnotizability scale with patients, but he plans to try hypnosis sessions and measure patients’ reactions to see if they’re effective. . “You have to be willing to fail a little bit in order to fail often enough to succeed,” he says.
Hypnosis is not successful in all cases and can actually be harmful in some cases, especially in the area of memory recovery.
Dr. Joseph P. Green, a professor of psychology at The Ohio State University in Lima, has studied how hypnotic suggestion can create distorted or false memories. He also found that people may believe that hypnotically induced memories are more reliable. This reflects the mistaken cultural belief that hypnosis acts like a truth-telling agent. Like most other memory recovery techniques, using hypnosis for memory recovery is “on thin ice,” Green says.
Hypnosis gained notoriety in the 1990s when some therapists used hypnotically induced memories to trick patients into believing they had been sexually abused or abused as children; In most cases, there was no supporting evidence. As a result, many innocent people were wrongly accused of abuse in hundreds of trials, Yapko said.
“People didn’t really understand the suggestibility of memory,” he says. Due to advances in his research, “that whole issue has now been largely shelved.”
In a 2007 decision, the Supreme Court of Canada established precedent that post-hypnosis evidence is unreliable and therefore inadmissible in court.in R. vs. Trochim, a court overturned a murder conviction after a witness changed the timeline of events after undergoing a hypnosis session ordered by detectives. The jury was not told that the witness had been hypnotized or that his memory had been altered.
“In short, while it is not generally accepted that hypnosis always produces unreliable memories, it is important to note when hypnosis produces false memories and when eyewitnesses, scientists, and fact-checkers believe they are fabricated memories. “It is also not clear how to distinguish between accurate memories,” the judgment states. .
in the smoke
Smokers should also be aware that there are a large number of hypnosis programs and tapes sold online that guarantee instant success. “Despite its widespread use, the scientific basis for its popularity is questionable,” Green said.
Green began researching hypnosis and smoking cessation more than 25 years ago after seeing the exaggerated claims of itinerant hypnotists who held weekend sessions in hotels before moving on to the next town. In the January article, American Journal of Clinical Hypnosis (Vol. 52, No. 3), Green and Dr. Stephen Jay Lin, professor of psychology at Binghamton University, wrote about a series of studies on hypnosis and smoking cessation, finding mixed results.
Literature review published in 2000 (International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, Vol. 48, No. 2), Green and Lynn analyzed 59 studies on hypnosis and smoking cessation. Hypnosis had a higher success rate than no treatment, but was generally comparable to other smoking cessation methods. However, many studies combined hypnosis with cognitive behavioral therapy or other treatments, making it impossible to determine the effectiveness of hypnosis alone. Professor Green said hypnosis could help smokers quit, but more research was needed. In a 2008 report published by the Cochrane Library, Neil C. Abbott, director of operations at ME Research UK, and colleagues reviewed nine randomized trials and recommended hypnosis as a specific treatment for smoking cessation. We also found insufficient evidence.
learn the tricks
Although more research is being done on the benefits of hypnosis, graduate schools have been slow to incorporate hypnosis training into psychology programs, Yapko, Wilmars and Montgomery said. “Universities are really dropping the ball by considering hypnosis to be a sideshow rather than something related to effective psychotherapy,” Yapko says.
While some graduate schools may not be convinced of the effectiveness of hypnosis or the research supporting its use, some schools, such as San Francisco’s Saybrook College School of Mind-Body Medicine, where Wilmars teaches a hypnosis course, offer clinical hypnosis. Some schools are developing classes in the art. At Washington State University, psychology professor Dr. Alade Barabas directs the hypnosis laboratory and teaches graduate-level hypnosis courses and research seminars.He is also the editor-in-chief of International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis.
Many psychologists have never taken a hypnosis class as part of their education and often seek training later in their careers. However, finding a class can be confusing, as a Google search for “hypnosis training” yields over 600,000 hits.
“You can go anywhere for a weekend and get certified in hypnosis,” Wilmarth says. “There are thousands of public hypnosis schools that are willing to train anyone for a tuition fee.”
To prevent psychologists from turning into charlatans, Wilmarth recommends a course approved by the American Society of Clinical Hypnosis. ASCH also offers certification in clinical hypnosis for medical professionals with a master’s degree or higher. Certification requires at least 40 hours of her ASCH approved workshop training, 20 hours of individual training, and 2 years of her independent practice using clinical hypnosis.
Wilmars said interest in clinical hypnosis is growing and more psychologists are learning how hypnosis can help patients.
“It comes in waves,” he says. “Right now, we’re on the upswing.”
Brendan L. Smith is a writer living in Washington, DC.
