Why is Hypnosis not used more in our NHS?
Written on June 8, 2026
'After years of academic research establishing the scientific basis of what we call 'hypnosis', and the many clinical research papers supporting its effectiveness as a treatment method in a variety of contexts, why is it not now routine practice in our health services?'
This question will need more than one post to address. First let's look at some evidence.
In 2016, I was asked to provide expert witness opinion in a case in which students were suing a university because of the poor quality of the course in clinical hypnosis which they were undertaking. I was instructed by the university's legal team, who provided me an enormous pile of documents, including promotional material for prospective students, extensive details of the selection procedure, the prospectus and syllabus, and the assessment protocols, and lengthy statements by the students themselves. I was appalled by what I read.
It was my opinion that the biggest mistake the university had made was entrusting the planning and construction of the course to one of the many private hypnosis organisations, albeit in liaison with a senior lecturer at the university experienced in hypnotherapy. The organisation provided its own private hypnotherapy training to individuals but had no meaningful authentication or authorisation relating to the demands of setting up a university course. Their promotional literature contained highly exaggerated claims about their own status and about the nature of hypnosis, including some nonsense about recent developments linking hypnosis with quantum physics.
But the thing that shocked me most was one of the promises held out to the students if they successfully completed of the course. They were informed that the qualification they received would enable them to work as hypnotherapists for the NHS. It was clear from the students' accounts that this was a significant inducement for their registering on the course and at no small financial cost to themselves.
In fact, my experience told me that while a relatively small number of medical doctors, dentists, psychologists and psychotherapists do choose to use hypnosis adjunctively in their NHS work, the NHS does not as a rule employ hypnotherapists and do not advertise such posts. (Over many years I have heard of just one or two ad hoc arrangements at certain units.) But impressions or not enough and I went in search of evidence.
The main evidence I obtained was from a freedom of information (FOI) request to all Clinical Commissioning Groups (note 1) in NHS England (just over 200), asking them if they commissioned hypnotherapy, either routinely or in the form of individual funding requests (IFRs).
From this survey it was clear that there was very little commissioning of hypnotherapy services. This was because CCGs classify hypnotherapy as akin to complementary and alternative therapy and thus a procedure that lacks evidence of clinical effectiveness. Even when, in many cases, the policy of the CCG was to consider funding hypnotherapy for irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) for which, of all the applications, probably the most extensive evidence for its effectiveness exists, it is still considered to be of questionable efficacy and only to be approved in cases of 'exceptionality' or 'rarity'. This very conservative approach is informed by the guidelines of the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) which, apart from IBS treatment, are not generally favourable towards hypnotherapy.
Of the few CCGs that had funded hypnotherapy, almost all the spend was for IBS at the South Manchester Functional Bowel Service, a world centre for research on IBS and hypnotherapy. Bury CCG provided the highest annual spend, totalling £13,632. The number of referrals would have been around 12 (cost per patient £1,100 to £1,200).
Note
1. CCGs were replaced by Integrated Care Systems in 2022.
'CCGs classify hypnotherapy as akin to complementary and alternative therapy and thus a procedure that lacks evidence of clinical effectiveness.' A very telling judgement. So where do we go from here?
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