Abstract
Mind–body medicine is a system of health practices that includes meditation/relaxation training, guided imagery, hypnosis, biofeedback, yoga, art/music therapy, prayer, t’ai chi, and psychological therapies such as cognitive behavioral therapy. Clinical hypnosis is an important mind–body tool that serves as an adjunct to conventional medical care for the adolescent patient. Clinical hypnosis specifically uses self-directed therapeutic suggestions to cultivate the imagination and facilitate the mind–body connection, leading to positive emotional and physical well-being. There are many similarities between clinical hypnosis and other mind–body/self-regulatory modalities such as visual imagery, mindfulness meditation, yoga, and biofeedback that incorporate experiential learning and mechanisms for change. They may be viewed as subtypes of the hypnotic experience and share the common experience of trance as the entrée into self-empowered change in physiologic and psychological states. Clinical hypnosis can be used by health care providers to teach adolescents coping skills to deal with a wide variety of conditions such as chronic headaches, recurrent abdominal pain, anxiety, depression, grief and bereavement, phobias, anger, family stressors, sleep disorders, or enuresis. Clinical vignettes are given to help illustrate the effectiveness of hypnosis in adolescents.
Highlights
Mind–body medicine is a philosophy and a system of health practices that enlist the mind in improving emotional well-being and physical health
Clinical hypnosis is a teachable coping skill that most adolescents are able to learn with minor effort, and it is safe, effective, and has no adverse side effects in trained hands
Hypnosis in adolescents is more permissive and less directive than in adults, as it utilizes the natural hypnotic abilities that teens bring to the clinical encounter
Summary
Mind–body medicine is a philosophy and a system of health practices that enlist the mind in improving emotional well-being and physical health. Mind–body therapies focus on balancing the autonomic nervous system (ANS) by activating the parasympathetic branch of the ANS to reduce the sympathetic physiological response to stress and by regulating the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis, both of which are indicators of stress This reduction of stress on the mind and body may help control or reverse certain underlying disease processes. Higher cognitive centers and limbic emotional centers are capable of regulating virtually all aspects of the immune system and have a profound effect on health and illness-termed psychoneuroimmunology [1,2,3] These therapies may improve the quality of life and reduce the physical symptoms for adolescents with various chronic diseases. Mind–body therapies such as clinical hypnosis are considered safe and can be effective for adolescents with medical conditions such as tension or migraine headaches, enuresis, recurrent abdominal pain, constipation, sleep difficulties, acute or chronic pain, anxiety, and other emotional and stress-related symptoms [6,7]
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