Welcome to our
private psychotherapy practice

Cancer and Hypnosis

Cancer patients suffer from a variety of distressing symptoms. The most distressing of these is severe pain. The medical team seek to control this by using a variety of medications. Unfortunately in some patients even powerful painkillers are not effective. In some patients the addition of an antidepressant drug will prove useful. However patients who do not respond to these measures often find that hypnosis is extremely helpful in controlling the pain.

Click Here to Make an Enquiry

Other very distressing symptoms include breathlessness, vomiting, skin irritation, out bursts of anger, and depression. Where one or more of these symptoms fail to respond to medication it may be very helpful to use hypnosis to reduce their severity. This is achieved by alternating the experience of the distressing symptom with a special place under conditions of hypnosis.

Difficulty in sleeping is a common problem for cancer patients. The first line of approach is to prescribe sleeping tablets. For many people this is an effective form of treatment. However, for those patients who do not wish to take sleeping tablets or have found them ineffective hypnosis can be invaluable.

The approach to insomnia is somewhat different from that used in pain control: in this instance the patient is given strong suggestions of sleep while hypnotised and is trained in self-hypnosis. The suggestion is made that the patient can learn to go from the waking state through hypnosis into sleep. The great advantage of this approach is that it does not necessitate the use of sleeping tablets at all.

Some cancer patients find that during the relaxation of hypnosis they are able to visualise scenes which in physical and practical terms it would be impossible to achieve. For example a patient who is unable to travel may go on an imaginary holiday and during the hypnosis may be able to feel that they are actually there in the holiday location.

Occasionally a patient expresses the wish to actually travel and has been given permission by the medical team to undertake such a journey but is apprehensive about doing so. Rehearsing each stage of the holiday including the outward and homebound journeys under hypnosis can be of great help in preparing the patient.

Prior to chemotherapy patients often develop nausea and may even vomit, hypnosis has been shown to be an extremely effective way of counteracting these symptoms.

When conventional forms of treatment have been unsuccessful, hypnosis has proved to be an effective alternative form of treatment.

For 10 years Dr Kraft worked with Cancer patients at Edenhall Marie Curie Centre in London.

Click Here to Make an Enquiry

Cigarette Addiction

In preparation for the new laws on smoking in public places coming in to force in 2007, now is the ideal time to give up smoking.

The fact that you are showing an interest in the treatment of smoking by looking up the subject on this web site is the first step towards giving up smoking.

The great advantage of using hypnosis for giving up smoking is that it removes the craving for cigarettes. An important part of the treatment is learning to carry out self-hypnosis. This is taught to the patient during the treatment session and is used by the patient at home for ten minutes each day to reinforce the treatment.

Most patients find that they have stop smoking after two or three sessions. Highly motivated patients will often stop after a single treatment session.

You do not have to be a good hypnosis subject in order for this form of treatment to be effective in stopping smoking. However it is important that you really do want to give up smoking and that you make the appointment yourself.

In 2005 87.5% of patients treated by Dr Kraft in this way had successfully stopped smoking in up to three sessions.

CLAUSTROPHOBIA

Patients suffering from Claustrophobia become panic stricken when they are in enclosed spaces. This may be a small room or a lift or even in a crowed place. Some individuals would rather climb many flights of stairs to the upper floors of a building than be enclosed in a lift. In severe cases the feelings of panic can spread to other areas such as the underground, buses and trains. A particular form of claustrophobia is the fear of flying where patients avoid air travel and find alternative means of transport to avoid being shut in an aeroplane.

Claustrophobia can be treated successfully either by the use of individual psychotherapy or hypnotherapy. If hypnotherapy is used then the patient is asked to imagine, during the hypnosis, the situation in which the panic attacks occur and this anxiety is counteracted by the use of a special place. As the treatment progresses and the patient becomes comfortable with one situation a more difficult scenario is introduced and so on, until the individual is able to cope with the feared situation without anxiety. In some cases this can only be achieved by having the therapist accompany the patient into the feared situation in real life. This is called "In Vivo Desensitization".

Psychotherapy enables the patient to gain insight into the underlying reason for their claustrophobia. However, it is still essential that the patient is encouraged and assisted by the therapist to gradually face the feared situation and eventually become anxiety free.



Dr. Kraft