The effectiveness of hypnosis to stop smoking

If you’re looking into the effectiveness of hypnosis to stop smoking there’s a good chance you’ve tried several methods to quit smoking already. Although it’s certainly not always the case, quitting smoking through hypnosis usually comes after willpower has been tried and other methods like patches or gum. This may in part be because people believe it to be an expensive remedy - and indeed professional hypnotherapists are well-paid individuals - but with a number of very good tapes, CDs and downloads available this is no longer the case. The use of such methods at home - effectively self hypnosis to quit smoking - is today a viable alternative.

But what of hypnotism as a solution? Does it work or is it just mumbo-jumbo? If you ask around, you’ll almost certainly find that some of your friends and acquaintances who had trouble giving up smoking with patches or gum found that hypnosis helped, while others will say that quitting smoking though hypnosis didn’t work for them.

It’s true that hypnosis does not work on everyone. Some people just don’t take to it. However, there is increasing evidence to suggest that it is a very good remedy in many cases and the AMA itself – who obviously have to be extremely careful in any recommendation they make – have stated that hypnotism is an effective adjunctive therapy (it works well on its own or in tandem with other therapies).

One important consideration when deciding whether to use hypnosis for smoking is contained in that previous sentence. It’s the fact that the AMA and other health organisations are quite happy for hypnotism to be used with other methods. Although perhaps unnecessary, the fact that you could combine a drug-based anti-smoking regime with hypnosis underlines its inherent safety. These days the acceptance of hypnotism as an effective alternative for many conditions (it has been approved by the American Medical Association since 1958) means that there are relatively few who are nervous about it but even they should be reassured by the recommendations offered by numerous leading medical and health organisations.

Another of your considerations is probably the withdrawal symptoms associated with stopping smoking. As a former smoker myself I understand where you’re coming from. It will therefore be encouraging for you to hear that the Journal of American Medicine found that there were little or no withdrawal symptoms when using hypnosis for quitting smoking.

So how can we gauge the effectiveness of hypnosis to stop smoking? We can’t really rely on word of mouth because each case is different. We can be re-assured by leading bodies like the AMA that it is recommended and that it does indeed work, but is that enough to convince you to give it a try? In the end, like all things, it has to be your decision. As a smoker myself for almost thirty years I can say that I found a self-hypnosis CD to be the method that finally worked for me. I’m probably now healthier in my late forties than I was in my early thirties! I hope the same for you.