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Feb. 22, 2001 -- Finding a quiet place in the mind can have a significant -- and sometimes dramatic -- effect on episodes of problematic breathing, according to Ran D. Anbar, MD, a pediatrician at SUNY Upstate Medical Center in Syracuse. In particular, he contends that children with chronic breathing problems can see major improvement by learning self-hypnosis techniques.
The benefits, Anbar says, come as the children learn to relax.
Relaxation is important, he says, because some of the symptoms of asthma are the result of anticipatory stress. That is, having an asthmatic attack breeds nervousness and, in turn, shortness of breath.
Asthma medications do little to relieve this nervousness, he says, but hypnosis can often help.
Anbar sees a lot of asthmatic patients -- 1,500, in fact. His worst case: a 12-year-old girl who had been taking the oral steroid prednisone for most of her life and was using an inhaled bronchodilator five times a day for shortness of breath.
"That means horrible asthma," Anbar says. But after the girl was taught self-hypnosis, her use of the bronchodilator virtually ceased within a few months. "Now we're weaning her from the prednisone," he says.
How is self-hypnosis taught to children?
Actually, Anbar says, it's a concept kids are already familiar with. Many children practice it every day, he says, when they drift away from the teacher and blackboard and into their own little world.
That mental method of letting go and drifting away is similar to what Anbar advocates for his asthma patients. He helps them identify a place in their imagination that's relaxing, and teaches them how to get there -- how to see it, smell it, hear it -- and then how to find a quick, shorthand method of recalling those relaxing feelings when they're needed. The technique can work, he says, even when the child is in a place, such as school or church, where she has to pay attention.
In February's issue of the journal Pediatrics, Anbar explains his approach in an article that details his treatment of 16 children with chronic shortness of breath.
The children in Anbar's study were between 8 and 18 years old, and age can be a factor in the success of the approach one hypnosis expert tells WebMD. "Children who might benefit from hypnosis treatment would need to be of an age that they are able to understand and follow instructions in learning hypnotic techniques," says Judith L. Allen, PhD of the American Psychotherapy and Medical Hypnosis Association.
It's best if a doctor teaches the child the technique, says Anbar, simply because a doctor can also simultaneously detect any physical disorders the patient might have. But given the shortage of doctors who know how to teach hypnosis, Anbar says parents should seek out a qualified, certified hypnotherapist.
Still, one asthma expert has concerns about teaching self-hypnosis to children.
The notion that a child's asthma can be made better through hypnosis might cause some parents to underestimate the disease, says Philip Norman, MD, of the Johns Hopkins Asthma and Allergy Center, in Baltimore -- and they shouldn't make that mistake.
"There are some children who will get rapidly worse if they stop their medications," warns Norman. "People do die of , and it's the most common cause of absenteeism in grade school."
In addition, he points out, asthma is an organic illness. "There's inflammation in the airways," he says. "We've been trying to live down the idea for years that asthma is all in your head."
Anbar agrees -- to an extent. "We have more recognition of what asthma is. But I do think stress and anxiety contributes to the incidence and severity of the disease," he tells WebMD.