When It Comes to Anxiety, Words Beat Pills

Anxious patients heading into surgery often receive medication to ease their fears, but a few calming words from their physicians might be more effective medicine. In fact, “conversational hypnosis” as the approach is known, might do a better job than pills for relaxing patients before anesthesia and surgery, suggests research presented at this week’s Anesthesiology 2015 annual meeting.

“The anesthesiologist uses calm, positive words to divert the patient’s attention and help him or her feel more comfortable,” said Emmanuel Boselli, MD, PhD, lead author of the study and a physician anesthesiologist at Édouard Herriot Hospital, Lyons, France. “It reflects a change in the way the physician interacts with the patient and takes just a few minutes.”

Researchers used conversational hypnosis, which consists of talking quietly and positively to the patient (for example, “Keep calm and quiet” instead of “Please don’t move”) and focusing the patient’s attention on something other than the preparations for surgery and anesthesia procedure.

See more news from the Anesthesiology 2015 meeting in the December issue of Same-Day Surgery.