In order to make a recommendation about the use of hypnosis as adjuvant therapy in the treatment of breast cancer, 2 studies assessing the immunological effects of hypnosis in patients with early stage breast cancer were evaluated: (a) an experiment that taught hypnotic guided-imagery therapy to patients and (b) one that provided participants with home visits and autogenic training. Both investigations demonstrated improvement in depression and increased natural killer (NK) cell counts after 2 months of hypnosis treatment. However, neither study determined the clinical significance of hypnosis in the setting of cancer, and therefore future experiments are needed to relate the immune-mediated effects of hypnosis to hard clinical outcomes like survival rates.

Int J Clin Exp Hypn. 2007 Oct;55(4):411-25. Hudacek KD. University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. hudacek@mail.med.upenn.edu

Posted: 05/07/2008



This article provided by The International Hypnosis Research Institute.

Enter your email address to subscribe to the IHRI Newsletter.

Overcome Loneliness Overcome Loneliness! This hypnosis session will address possible feelings of low confidence or self-esteem that keep you from meeting new people. You’ll start to feel more accepting of yourself & find new ways to meet and get to know people.

Nightmares No More! Nightmares NO MORE!A study published in the June 2007 Issue of the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine showed that hypnosis was extremely effective helping patients suffering from long term nightmare problems eliminate recurring nightmares.

Insomnia No More! Insomnia NO MORE!Hypnosis is EXTREMELY effective in helping you retrain yourself to sleep.You’ll start to immediately notice that you fall asleep faster and you find you have more and more nights where you sleep through till morning.