Disseminating Hypnosis to Health Care Settings: Applying the RE-AIM Framework

• Published in: Psychology of consciousness (Washington, D.C.) D.C.), 2014-06, Vol.1 (2), p.213-228
• Main Authors: Yeh, Vivian M, Schnur, Julie B, Montgomery, Guy H
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Brief Psychotherapy; Human; Hypnosis; Intervention; Public Health
• ISSN: 2326-5523; 2326-5531
• DOI: 10.1037/cns0000012

Hypnosis is a brief intervention ready for wider dissemination in medical contexts. Overall, hypnosis remains underused, despite evidence supporting its beneficial clinical impact. This review will evaluate the evidence supporting hypnosis for dissemination using guidelines formulated by Glasgow, Vogt, and Boles (1999). Five dissemination dimensions will be considered: reach, efficacy, adoption, implementation, and maintenance (RE-AIM). Hypnosis is capable of a wide reach in medical settings because the intervention can help a diverse range of individuals with a variety of problems. Efficacy studies support the use of hypnosis for chronic pain, acute pain, and emotional distress arising from medical procedures and conditions, cancer-treatment-related side-effects, and irritable bowel syndrome. Although adoption of hypnosis is currently limited, evidence suggests that patients and healthcare providers are open to trying hypnosis and may become more so when educated about what hypnosis can do. Implementation of hypnosis into medical settings can occur with ease because hypnosis is a brief intervention capable of being administered effectively by a range of health care providers. Maintenance will likewise be attainable given the low resource needs of hypnosis, opportunities for reimbursement, and the ability of the intervention to potentially help medical settings reduce costs. In sum, hypnosis has the qualities necessary to be integrated into routine care in medical settings in a self-sustaining way and is a promising candidate for further dissemination.