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Mar 20 2008

Hypnotherapy Investigation

Thursday, 20 March 2008

BBC2 is running a short series on alternative therapies presented by Professor Kathy Sykes (Professor of Science at Bristol University). The first episode was on Monday 17th March 2008 and featured hypnotherapy. I didn’t have very high expectations so was pleasantly surprised at some of the content. It is still available on the BBC iPlayer for a few days.

Interesting research

There were two or three pieces of research worth mentioning.

IBS

I already knew about the research in Manchester which shows how helpful hypnotherapy can be for Irritable Bowel Syndrome. The consultant used healing suggestions while the client was in hypnosis, which was found to be beneficial.

However there was no mention of the benefits of regular deep relaxation, or what can be gained by allowing the client a voice in the process. In my experience it’s worth seeing whether there is underlying emotional stress which may be contributing to the condition.

Working with one client who had an ongoing bowel problem, it was possible to pin point the onset to the time when a long standing relationship finished. In hypnosis I asked how they had felt at the time. “Gutted!” they said, and smiled as they made the connection.

Suggestible People

A certain percentage of the population is recognised as being more suggestible that the rest of us. These people tend to go into hypnosis very easily and make good hypnotic subjects.

A researcher in Italy is looking at the brain activity of these people doing a certain task in different conditions.

They are asked to “see” a black and white picture as colour whilst in hypnosis and then have to repeat the task in full awareness. The researcher had expected the same part of the brain to be active for each task but was very surprised to discover that an entirely different area was active in full consciousness from that which was active in hypnosis.

Anticipation of pain

A research team in Canada are comparing hypnosis with the placebo effect in the study of pain anticipation. Again, in hypnosis different areas of the brain were activated than when in full awareness but using a placebo.

Where the programme disappointed

I wanted the programme to go so much further.
It could have looked at what happens to brain waves in hypnosis
It could have looked at the psychological, emotional and physical benefits of the deep relaxation offered by hypnosis, especially when undertaken on a regular basis
It could have discussed in much more detail the subjective experiences of hypnotherapy clients, in particular how hypnosis feels to them
It could have explored the work of dynamic hypnotherapy where the client is much more involved in the therapeutic process. (That’s the type of work I do) Instead it concentrated only on the effects of suggestion.

So, worth watching, better than I thought it would be, but not quite good enough.

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