If you’ve ever read an article on your computer screen and stopped to realize you have no idea what you just read, you’ve experienced something similar to highway hypnosis.
A commuter train engineer told investigators he was in a “daze” moments before the Dec. 1 derailment that killed four people in New York City. That could have been highway hypnosis, experts say.
“When we’re tired, effectively there’s a change in the state of our brain that results in that information just not getting to those centers where we actively, consciously process it,” said Sean Meehan, a University of Michigan kinesiology professor.
A person who has lapsed into highway hypnosis is experiencing slowed brain activity, Meehan said, meaning different parts of the brain aren’t communicating with one another as frequently as when the person is fully conscious. It’s actually similar to the brain activity of someone who is asleep, and is most likely to occur in a driver who is tired, he said.
As a result, the driver’s reaction time is slowed, he said.
“I’m sure most people experienced this on a long trip where they all of the sudden realize they really haven’t been aware of what they’re doing,” said Meehan, who is currently working with the Hyundai-Kia Technical Center to determine the feasibility of a device that would tell car drivers when their brain activity has slowed.
Going into this autopilot-like mode often happens on long, mundane highway drives with few turns or traffic signals, Meehan said. The driver usually can’t recognize highway hypnosis until his environment is somehow jostled — another car cuts him off or he hits a bump.
Drowsy driving results in more than 100,000 crashes a year, resulting in 1,550 deaths, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Highway hypnosis often gets lumped into drowsy driving because it happens in tired drivers, Meehan said.
Still, a highway isn’t the only place it can happen. It can happen on a train, Meehan said, though it hasn’t been blamed for any other train accidents to his knowledge. It can also happen at your desk when your eyes gloss over a work document and you realize you didn’t comprehend it.
To prevent highway hypnosis on the road, Meehan suggests taking a break every 90 minutes or so, or — if you’re lucky enough to be driving with someone else — switch drivers.
Listening to the radio isn’t enough to prevent this daze, and can even contribute to it, he cautioned. And always get at least six hours of sleep the night before a long trip, he said.
The University of Kansas Transportation Center published guide for rural transit drivers to avoid driver fatigue. In addition to Meehan’s tips, it suggests keeping the vehicle cool and maintaining good posture to stay alert.
Instead of pills and needles, hypnosis may ease the pain of surgery both during and after the procedure.
According to a new study, women who received hypnosis before breast cancer surgery needed less anesthesia during the procedure, reported less pain afterward, needed less time in the operating room and had reduced costs.
“This helps women at a time when they could use help, and it has no side effects. It really only has side benefits,” said Guy Montgomery, lead author of the report and associate professor in the department of oncological sciences at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City.
Montgomery hopes that the study, published online in the Aug. 28 issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, will promote greater use of hypnosis in medical treatments.
Side effects such as pain, nausea and fatigue — both during and after breast cancer surgery — are commonplace. Previous research has suggested that hypnosis, a simple and inexpensive procedure, can help ease these problems. One small clinical study indicated that hypnosis was also effective for breast cancer patients about to undergo surgery.
For the new study, 200 women set for breast cancer surgery were randomly assigned to receive either 15 minutes of hypnosis with a psychologist or assigned to a group that simply spoke with a psychologist.
During the hypnosis session, the patients received suggestions for relaxation and pleasant imagery as well as advice on how to reduce pain, nausea and fatigue. They also received instructions on how to use hypnosis on their own.
The researchers found that women in the hypnosis group required less anesthesia and sedatives than patients in the control group, and also reported less pain, nausea, fatigue, discomfort and emotional upset after the surgery.
Those who received hypnosis also spent almost 11 minutes less time in surgery and had their surgical costs reduced by about $773, mainly as a result of the shorter time.
Although people think that hypnosis strips a person of control, it actually does just the opposite, said Dr. David Spiegel, author of an accompanying editorial in the journal and professor and associate chairman of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine.
“This is something that empowers patients,” Spiegel explained. “If you’re fighting, you think you’re protecting yourself, but, actually, you’re losing control, because you’re getting into a struggle with your own body. You can teach people to float instead of fighting. You get the body comfortable and think more clearly. The weird thing is it actually works. If thoughts can make the body worse, it follows that thoughts could actually make the body feel better.”
Will hypnosis catch on with health-care providers?
“We have this in-built skepticism of what goes on in the brain and the mind, and the idea is that the only real intervention is a physical one. Yet what supposedly distinguishes us is this huge brain on top of our bodies,” Spiegel said. “It seems more scientific and desirable to give drugs than it does to talk to people and have them reorganize the way they’re managing their bodies.”
There are other obstacles. Many doctors find it more expedient to write a prescription than learn to perform hypnosis. Also, there’s no industry pushing the technique as there is with drugs, Spiegel said.
On the positive side, little investment is needed to get a hypnosis program going, Montgomery said. “A psychologist or nurse could get training in a short period of time,” he said. “It’s not that involved.”
Dr. Darlene Miltenburg, assistant professor of surgery at Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine, called the new study “superb.”
“Anybody who has an open mind would realize that this treatment works and is scientifically proven. It’s not black magic,” Miltenburg said. “It’s real, and we do use it here. It’s very time consuming, that’s part of the problem, taking a pill is much easier. But just like many things in life, we want a quick fix rather than something that takes longer.”
To learn more, visit the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine.
90.6% Success Rate for Smoking Cessation: Of 43 consecutive patients undergoing this treatment protocol, 39 reported remaining abstinent from tobacco use at follow-up 6 months to 3 years post-treatment. Int J Clin Exp Hypn. 2001 Jul;49(3):257-66. Barber J.
Hypnosis 30 Times as Effective for Weight Loss: Investigated the effects of hypnosis in weight loss for 60 females, at least 20% overweight. Treatment included group hypnosis with metaphors for ego-strengthening, decision making and motivation, ideomotor exploration in individual hypnosis, and group hypnosis with maintenance suggestions. Hypnosis was more effective than a control group: an average of 17 lbs lost by the hypnosis group vs. an average of 0.5 lbs lost by the control group on follow-up. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 54, 489-492.
Hypnosis Reduces Frequency and Intensity of Migraines: Results show that the number of attacks and the number of people who suffered blinding attacks were significantly lower for the group receiving hypnotherapy than for the group receiving medication. International Journal of Clinical & Experimental Hypnosis 1975; 23(1): 48-58.
Hypnosis Reduces Pain and Speeds up Recovery from Surgery: Since 1992, we have used hypnosis routinely in more than 1400 patients undergoing surgery. We found that hypnosis improved intraoperative patient comfort, reduced anxiety, pain, intraoperative requirements for anxiolytic and analgesic drugs, optimal surgical conditions and a faster recovery of the patient. Rev Med Liege. 1998 Jul; 53(7):414-8.
Hypnosis Lowered Post-treatment Pain in Burn Injuries: Patients in the hypnosis group reported less post treatment pain than did patients in the control group. Journal of Consulting & Clinical Psychology 1997; 65(1): 60-7.
Healed 41% faster from fracture and surgery: Two studies from Harvard Medical School show hypnosis significantly reduces the time it takes to heal. Study One: Six weeks after an ankle fracture, those in the hypnosis group showed the equivalent of eight and a half weeks of healing. Study Two: Three groups of people studied after breast reduction surgery. Hypnosis group healed “significantly faster” than supportive attention group and control group. Harvard Medical School Gazette May 8, 2003
In the largest long-term study of hypnotherapy for irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) to date, seven out of 10 patients reported an improvement in symptoms after treatment and four out of five respondents maintained the improvement for years after stopping hypnosis. Those who did not maintain a response to hypnosis only deteriorated slightly.
“We have known that this treatment is effective, but this study confirms that patients can maintain the improvements for many years,” researcher Wendy M. Gonsalkorale, PhD, tells WebMD. “There is growing interest in hypnosis for the treatment of IBS, but too few patients know about it.”
Most Sufferers Are Women
As many as 58 million Americans suffer from the symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome and four out of five sufferers are women, based on figures from the American College of Gastrointerology.
Typically people with IBS have recurrent symptoms of abdominal pain, distention, and altered bowel movements — diarrhea, constipation, or a combination of both. Because there is no obvious cause for the array of gastrointestinal disturbances experienced by patients and conventional GI treatments often do not work.
It has been almost two decades since British researcher Peter Whorwell and colleagues first reported on the use of hypnotherapy in the treatment of IBS. Since that time other small studies have also shown hypnosis to be effective, but this new research, appearing in the latest issue of Gut, is the first to follow a large group of patients for years after treatment.
For the study, Gonsalkorale and Whorwell followed 204 patients for up to six years. Researchers asked patients to score their IBS symptoms, as well as their overall quality of life, and levels of depression and anxiety immediately before hypnotherapy and after the treatment. They also responded to a mailed questionnaire sent at least a year and no more than six years after treatment ended. The hypnotherapy course consisted of 12-weekly, one-hour sessions.
Almost three-quarters of the patients (71%) gave positive reports following hypnotherapy, and 81% said they maintained their improvement over time. The sustained improvements reported by most of the patients could not be attributed to other treatments because fewer than one in 10 used other treatments following hypnotherapy.
“This study demonstrates that the beneficial effects of hypnotherapy appear to last at least five years,” the researchers write. “Thus, it is a viable therapeutic option for the treatment of irritable bowel syndrome.”
Researcher Olafur S. Palsson, PsyD, who has studied IBS says the number of patients in the new study and the length of follow-up put hypnosis in a favorable light and possibly show it may be the most effective long-term treatment for irritable bowel syndrome. But he says that it is still rarely offered to IBS patients and is not often covered by insurance.
“Hypnotherapy still carries the aura of mystery and magic, and is not really used much for medical conditions in this country,” Palsson says. “It requires special training that clinicians in most medical settings simply do not have. And it is considered more costly than drug therapy because it requires repeated sessions.”
The University of North Carolina researcher says hypnosis may actually be much cheaper than other treatments because the long-term results appear to be so promising.
“There are only a couple of medications approved for the treatment of irritable bowel syndrome, and it can be expensive to keep patients on these medications long-term,” says Palsson. “For many patients, hypnotherapy is a very cost-effective way of improving outcome.”
A Boston area Hypnotherapist, with 10 years of medical experience as an RN, Paul has been helping clients since 2001 to overcome everyday challenges. Read more
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If you’ve ever read an article on your computer screen and stopped to realize you have no idea what you just read, you’ve experienced something similar to highway hypnosis.
driver who is tired, he said.
Still, a highway isn’t the only place it can happen. It can happen on a train, Meehan said, though it hasn’t been blamed for any other train accidents to his knowledge. It can also happen at your desk when your eyes gloss over a work document and you realize you didn’t comprehend it.
Instead of pills and needles, hypnosis may ease the pain of surgery both during and after the procedure.
They also received instructions on how to use hypnosis on their own.
Will hypnosis catch on with health-care providers?
In the largest long-term study of hypnotherapy for irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) to date, seven out of 10 patients reported an improvement in symptoms after treatment and four out of five respondents maintained the improvement for years after stopping hypnosis. Those who did not maintain a response to hypnosis only deteriorated slightly.
time other small studies have also shown hypnosis to be effective, but this new research, appearing in the latest issue of Gut, is the first to follow a large group of patients for years after treatment.
“Hypnotherapy still carries the aura of mystery and magic, and is not really used much for medical conditions in this country,” Palsson says. “It requires special training that clinicians in most medical settings simply do not have. And it is considered more costly than drug therapy because it requires repeated sessions.”
