Hypnosis

Effective hypnosis is administered by medical professionals.

If your hypnotist wears a muumuu and swings a crystal in front of your eyes, your quack alarm should be going off. A legit therapist will be trained and licensed in a specialty (medicine, psychiatry, psychology, or even dentistry for pain control) and use hypnosis within the context of that expertise. So instead of flipping through the phone book, ask your doctor if he/she knows of a licensed specialist or seek a referral through one of the following professional societies: the Society for Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis or the American Society for Clinical Hypnosis.

“Part of the mythology about hypnosis is that you’re going to take over somebody’s mind,” says Dr. David Spiegel, Willson Professor and associate chair of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine. “What you really do is teach people to take better control of their own mind and body.” He explains that patients are not simply treated but taught self-hypnosis so they can continue treating themselves after initial sessions.

Using a single-session hypnosis treatment, Spiegel and his colleagues at Stanford’s Center for Integrative Medicine see incredible results for kicking the smoking habit: Half of all smokers will stop immediately, and half of that group won't have a cigarette for two years, yielding a long-term success rate of nearly 1 in 4. Their approach—pioneered by Spiegel’s father, Dr. Herbert Spiegel—is used by many other specialists as well. By contrast, Spiegel notes, the Great American Smokeout sees about 1 in 10 smokers abstaining for six months.

Hypnosis is also effective in treating anxiety and phobias, such as fear of flying. It can help treat symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder, and new research indicates it also may relieve depression.

Building on those findings, an August 2007 study published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute found multiple benefits for women undergoing surgery for breast cancer. Patients who received brief hypnotic sessions beforehand experienced “less pain, less medication, and fewer complications,” says Spiegel, who contributed an editorial trumpeting the merits of hypnosis. “Procedures were also completed faster, and it saved about $780 per procedure. Hypnosis can be very effective in the surgical setting—very good for pain control.”

To the extent that the brain plays a role in physical function—as in the perception of pain—hypnosis can influence how the body repairs itself. For instance, some studies have suggested that hypnosis can expedite the healing of wounds after trauma or surgery.

Spiegel cites the example of irritable bowel syndrome, a painful condition of the large intestine. “We’ve shown that you can increase or decrease the secretion of gastric acid just by eating imaginary meals or relaxing and not thinking about eating,” says Spiegel.

He clarifies that hypnosis won’t make conditions like cancer or coronary artery disease go away but that it does push the envelope of one’s ability to control mind and body.

Contrary to popular belief, one’s capacity to be hypnotized is not a matter of intelligence (or lack thereof). Research suggests there are both genetic and experiential components to who is or is not hypnotizable. Those who had active imaginations in childhood—whether they were encouraged to be creative or used imagination to escape an unpleasant world—seem to be more easily hypnotized.

Confused by health myths and misinformation? Each week, Rich Maloof talks to leading health experts to bring you the straight facts on a broad range of health topics.

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