Irritable Bowel Syndrome

"Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a chronic functional gastrointestinal disorder characterized by abdominal pain associated with altered stool frequency and consistency. It affects 10 to 15% of the adult population. Conventional medical approaches to IBS management are unstatisfactory for more than half of the patients.

Whitehead (2006) reviewing 11 studies, including 5 controlled studies assessing the therapeutic effects of hypnosis for IBS demonstrated that hypnosis has a substantial therapeutic impact on IBS, even for patients who do not respond to standard medical treatment. The median response rate to hypnosis treatment is 87%, bowel symptoms improve by about half, psychological symptoms and life functioning improve and therapeutic gains are maintained for most patients for years after the end of hypnosis treatment.

The landmark study that demonstrated for the first time the potential for hypnosis as a therapeutic modality for IBS using placebo control was done by Whorwell and colleagues of Wythenshawe Hospital, Manchester, UK, published in Lancet (1984). The hypnosis group trained in a "gut focused" hypnotherapeutic technique aiming to teach the patient the necessary hypnotic skills to control and help normalize gut function, described in detail by Gonsalkorale (2006), showed very substantial improvement in all the central IBS symptoms after treatment and was significantly more improved on all outcome variables than the control group which only showed minimal improvement with slight decrease in abodminal pain and bloating. All patients remained better at 18-month follow-up. The positive therapeutic effects of hypnosis on IBS were reported by Whorwell (1987) at a later study in which he states 'We have assessed the long-term benefits of hypnosis in IBS and found that 83% of original responders remain well between 1 and 5 years following their original course of treatment. In addition, their medication needs and consultations with either specialists or general practitioners became dramatically reduced.'

Hypnotherapy can be successfully integrated into the functional gastroenterology service (Whorwell, 2006)."

  Extracted from various papers published in the International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis