Soothing Imagery May Help Rid Some Kids of Stomach Pain – Yahoo! News
TUESDAY, Oct. 13 (HealthDay News) — Children who experience frequent
stomach aches can use their imagination to reduce their pain, new study
findings suggest.
The study included 34 participants, aged 6 to 15 years, with functional
abdominal pain, which is a persistent pain with no identifiable underlying
disease. All the children received standard medical care, but 19 also
received eight weeks of guided imagery therapy, which is similar to
self-hypnosis.
The audio recordings for the guided imagery therapy consisted of four
bi-weekly, 20-minute sessions and 10-minute daily sessions. The therapy
offered the children suggestions and imagery for reducing abdominal
discomfort. For example, in one session they were told to imagine a
special shiny object melting in their hand. They then placed the hand on
their abdomen, spreading warmth and light from the hand into the belly in
order to create a protective barrier that prevents anything from
irritating the belly.
The children in the guided imagery group were almost three times more
likely to experience improvement in their abdominal pain than those who
received standard treatment alone, the researchers found. The benefits of
the guided imagery lasted for six months after the end of the
sessions.
“What is especially exciting about our study is that children can
clearly reduce their abdominal pain a lot on their own with guidance from
audio recordings, and they get much better results that way than from
medical care,” study lead author Miranda van Tilburg, an assistant
professor in the gastroenterology and hepatology division of the
University of North Carolina School of Medicine, and a member of the UNC
Center for Functional GI and Motility Disorders, said in a university news
release.
“Such self-administered treatment is, of course, very inexpensive and
can be used in addition to other treatments, which potentially opens the
door for easily enhancing treatment outcomes for a lot of children
suffering from frequent stomach aches,” she added.
The study appears in the November issue of the journal
Pediatrics.
More information
The Nemours Foundation has more about children and belly pain.
Mail this post