What is Hypnosis? Does it Really Work?

Is there any research to prove that hypnosis works?

There is much more research than could be cited here. But here are some examples;

MEDICAL APPLICATIONS

PAIN, MISCELLANEOUS:

1. Ernest Hilgard (1977) et al.: in large studies, using experimental paradigms to induce pain (typically either a tourniquet cutting off the limb’s circulation or precipitating the limb into cold water), have shown that various types of pain can be reduced by hypnotically induced analgesia.

In these studies, 66% of the high susceptibility group, but only 13% of the low and 17% of the medium susceptibility groups, were able to reduce their pain by 1/3 or more. Twenty-six percent of the high, 57% of the medium, and 31% of the low susceptibility group were able to reduce their pain by 10-32% compared to controls.

2. Experimentally induced pain, while undoubtedly more harmful, differs from the experience of patients in a clinical setting. While experimental pain is short, voluntarily submitted, and can be terminated at any time by the subject, in a clinical setting, pain is often long, comes against the individual’s will and is usually beyond personal control. It is part of the disease process that directly alters both physical and mental functioning.

3. In the neurochemical study Hypnotic control of pain made by Domangue (1985), patients suffering from arthritic pain showed a correlation between the levels of pain, anxiety and depression. Anxiety and depression were inversely related to plasma norepinephrine. Depression is correlated with dopamine levels and negatively correlated with serotonin and beta endorphin levels. According to Hypnotherapy, there were clinically and statistically significant decreases in depression, anxiety and pain, and increases in beta-endorphin-like substances.

4. The relationship between pain and endorphins is complex. In his study, Guerra (1982) found only particular forms of beta endorphins in the peripheral blood that were associated with a hypnotic response during pain experiences.

5. Hilgard (1982) studied cancer in children. Hypnosis has been found to be effective in reducing pain and discomfort with frequent unpleasant medical findings.

6. Stam (1986) reports that patients with chronic facial pain show greater responsiveness to suggestion as measured by the Carleton University Responsiveness to Suggestion Scale (CURSS) than do normal controls. These patients had higher hypnotic susceptibility scores than controls, showing that a high susceptibility score is a good predictor of response to hypnotic treatment among such patients.

7. Domangue (1985) conducted a study of 19 patients with various musculoskeletal disorders. He reported significant reductions in pain and dysphoria following hypnosis. Reductions were associated with significant increases in plasma beta endorphin.

8. Barabasz and Barabasz (1989) studied a sample of 20 patients with various chronic pain syndromes. They used a hypnotic technique known as Restricted Environmental Stimulation Therapy (REST). All patients were initially assessed as having low hypnotic susceptibility on the Stanford Hypnotic Susceptibility Scale (SHSS). Subjects exposed to technical training demonstrated significant increases in both SHSS scores and pain reduction when compared to controls.

Headache:

9. Evidence accumulated over time suggests that several hypnotherapeutic approaches are highly effective in the treatment of patients with chronic migraine headaches. Although no hypnotherapeutic technique has been shown to be the most effective, all methods appear to be superior to standard pharmacological treatment approaches relied upon alone.

12. In research conducted by Schlutter (1980), Hypnosis was also found to be effective in the treatment of tension headaches.

14. A study (Gutfeld, G. and Rao, L., 1992) was conducted on 42 patients suffering from chronic headaches. These patients, all of whom had responded poorly to conventional treatments, were divided into two groups. Hypnotherapy is one way to relieve everyday pain; the others acted as a comparison group. An expert Hypnotherapy group reduces the frequency and duration of headaches, cutting the intensity by about 30%. “These results are huge in such difficult and difficult to treat patients,” commented Egilius Spiringus, M.D., Ph.D. section director, division of neurology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital.

15. Speigel and Bloom (1983b) reported a study of women with metastatic breast and showed patients. The therapy group that received training in hypnosis over a one-year period were able to reduce their pain experience by 50% compared to the control group.

16. In addition, during the 10-year follow-up of these same women, the Hypnosis treatment group had an average survival rate of 36.6 months compared to 18.9 months for the control group. This suggests that intervention is an effect of quantitative importance and quantitative importance (Spiegel 1989a).

17-18 Adult and adolescent cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy were reported by Cotanch (1985) and by Zeltzer (1984), in separate studies, to have fewer symptoms of nausea preceding and vomiting following hypnotic interventions.

CARDIOVASCULAR CONDITION, GENERAL:

19. In research by Bernardi (1982), hypertensive patients showed themselves to be significantly more effective at controlling cardiovascular responses to stressors in hypnosis than they were in a normal waking state. This was especially true for subjects with a greater hypnotic ability.

20. In a study by Sletvold (1986), normotensive subjects were shown to be able to increase or decrease their blood pressure significantly with Hypnosis .

21. In a 1979 research study Jackson, subjects with hypnotic ability were shown to improve their aerobic work significantly in response to being posthypnotic suggestion In addition, subjects with high hypnotic susceptibility significantly improved their performance in physical exercise using posthypnotic suggestion.

HYPERTENSION & Summary:

22. Kuttner (1988) found that the hypnotic approach of emphasizing storytelling and imagery was significantly more effective than technique or medical practice in alleviating distress through Bone marrow aspiration in children with leukemia.

23. Hypertensive subjects were found to have characteristic patterns of increased cerebral blood flow that were most marked in the left hemisphere. In Hypnosis, the cerebral blood flow is more disturbed than the flow of normotensive powers could reduce. Changes in this research were noted by Galeazzi (1982) with decreases in vascular resistance and diastolic blood pressure. in the rest of the body.

24-25. Friedman and Taub (1977, 1978) reported the results of a trial comparing hypnosis with biofeedback or a combination of both in essential hypertension. After four weeks of treatment, all groups showed a significant reduction in blood. . But at the six-month follow-up, only patients receiving hypnosis maintained a reduction.

26-27. A general literature review supports the value of hypnosis in analgesia and stress reduction in many disorders, whether following a dissociative formulation (Miller, 1986) or a social psychology approach (Noland, 1987).

Respiratory conditions:

28-29 In studies by Maher-Loughnan (1962, 1970), hypnosis was shown to alleviate the subjective distress of asthmatic patients. This change was measured either by the number of attacks or the amount of medication needed compared to supportive therapy.

30. In a further study by Maher-Loughnan (1970), asthmatic subjects were randomly assigned to either hypnosis or relaxation therapy. The results of both treatments showed a degree of comfort for the patients, but the improvement in the Hypnotherapy group was significantly greater. The peak of improvement was between the seventh and twelfth weeks of treatment. In addition, only hypnotic subjects showed improvement in physiological measures of respiration (forced expiratory volume).

31. Ewer and Stewart (1986) reported a controlled trial of hypnosis in patients with moderate asthma. Patients with high hypnotic susceptibility showed a 74.9% improvement in bronchial hyper-responsiveness (to methacholine challenge), a 5.5% increase in peak expiratory flow, a 26.2% decrease in bronchodilator use and a 41% improvement in extra daily ratings. of the clinic Twelve patients with a high hypotensive susceptibility score showed a 75% improvement. However, a control group of 17 patients and a second group of 10 patients with a low level of hypnotic susceptibility showed no change in objective or subjective measures.

32. A study by Olness (1985) demonstrated that children trained in self-hypnosis could significantly change their skin oxygen levels as measured by transcutaneous PO2 measurements.

CONFIRMATION OF THE IMMUNE SYSTEM:

33. Hypnosis strengthens the disease-fighting capacity of two types of immune cells, reports Patricia Ruzyla-Smith and her colleagues at Washington State University in Pullman. Thirty-three college students who achieved the hypnotic transition easily and 32 students who did it with great difficulty. are recruited for study. Students who underwent hypnosis had greater jumps in white blood cells than participants who received relaxation or not. method The greatest immune enhancement occurred among the highly hypnotizable students in the Hypnosis group.

Intestinal conditions:

34-35. Whorwell (1984) reported successful treatment of Irritable Bowel Syndrome using Hypnosis in a controlled study of a group of patients with severe chronic disorder and had not responded to conventional therapy. Patients were randomly assigned to either psychotherapy or hypnotherapy. Psychotherapy patients showed a significant improvement in pain relief, relaxation and general well-being despite the lack of change in bowel habits. In contrast, hypnotherapy patients showed dramatic improvement in all measures that persisted at two-year follow-up. (Worwell, 1987). Hypnotherapy, including suggestions for improved gastrointestinal function and pain reduction, was significantly better than simple hypnosis for deep muscle relaxation.

36. Harvey (1989) reported a similar improvement following hypnotherapy in 20 of 33 patients with refractory Irritable Bowel Syndrome in three months follow.

37. Colgan (1988) reported a randomized trial of 30 patients with recurrent duodenal ulcer disease. Subjects were treated for ten weeks with either hypnotherapy or ranitidine or medication alone. At twelve-month follow-up, all drug-only patients, but only half of the drug-plus-hypnotherapy patients, had relapsed.

HEMOPHELIA:

38. Swirsky-Saccetti (1986) reported on research with hemophiliacs. Over an eighteen-week follow-up, the group of hemophiliac patients who were taught self-hypnosis significantly reduced both their levels of self-reported distress and the amount of factor they had to concentrate on to control bleeding compared to a control group of patients. who did not undergo hypnosis.

39. A 30-month follow-up by LaBaw (1975) with hemophiliac patients demonstrated the effectiveness of group procedures for self-hypnosis in reducing anxiety and the amount of blood products required compared to a control group of patients from five to forty-five. Acting in his eighth year.

SURGERY:

40. Patients undergoing head and neck surgery who were trained in preoperative hypnosis had significantly less postoperative hospitalizations than matched controls ( Rapkin, 1988).

41. Swedish researchers studied fifty previous female surgeries. Twenty-five women were assigned to an experimental group who were briefly hypnotized each day for several days before their operations. Twenty-five were assigned to the control group, which were not hypnotized. While in the hypnotic state, the women in the experimental group heard suggestions to relax and get hungry. After surgery only 10 had nausea (15 experienced no nausea), compared to 17 in the no-hypnosis control group (8 experienced no nausea).

KIND:

42. In 1963, Schwartz reported on research in which he used Hypnotherapy successfully to prolong pregnancy and prevent research was cited on Hypnosis methods. It has been successfully used for anxiety with a medical system.

51. Two hundred and forty-one patients, who were undergoing percutaneous vascular and renal transplantation, were randomly tested on three diets, one of which was hypnosis. Patients rated pain and anxiety on scales of 1-10 before, every 15 minutes during, and after the procedure. Pain persisted throughout the procedure in the Hypnosis group; Pain increased linearly with time in both groups. Anxiety decreased over time in all three areas; the decrease was sharpest in the group that was hypnotized. Behavior times were significantly shorter in the Hypnosis group. In addition, Hypnosis has been shown to be superior in improving hemodynamic stability.

PHOBIC reactions: