Disseminating hypnosis to health care settings: Applying the RE-AIM framework

Abstract

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 and colleagues (1999). Five dissemination dimensions will be considered: Reach, Efficacy, Adoption, Implementation, and Maintenance (RE-AIM).

Reach: In medical settings, hypnosis is capable of helping a diverse range of individuals with a wide variety of problems.

Efficacy: There is evidence supporting 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.

Adoption: Although hypnosis is currently not a part of mainstream clinical practices, 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: Hypnosis is a brief intervention capable of being administered effectively by healthcare providers.

Maintenance: Given the low resource needs of hypnosis, opportunities for reimbursement, and the ability of the intervention to potentially help medical settings reduce costs, the intervention has the qualities necessary to be integrated into routine care in a self-sustaining way in medical settings. In sum, hypnosis is a promising candidate for further dissemination.

Keywords: Hypnosis; RE-AIM; brief interventions; dissemination; public health.