In Some Surgeries, Hypnosis Is the New General Anesthesia
Women undergoing lumpectomies for breast cancer are going to their ‘happy place’
Beverly Levinson pictured herself sitting by the large outdoor fireplace at her mountain house in North Carolina, the Blue Ridge and Great Smoky mountains unrolling before her. She breathed in deeply, filling her nose with earthy notes of the surrounding forest. A warm breeze touched her skin, and she could hear the leaves rustling in the old oak trees. Voices murmured overhead, but in her semiconscious state, all Levinson could make out was the calm tenor of hypnotist Rosalinda Engle telling her to relax her jaw.
In reality, Levinson was lying on the operating table in a surgical suite at MD Anderson Cancer Center while her doctor resected a tumor from her right breast — a far cry from the tranquil scene she imagined. An anesthesiologist gave her the painkillers fentanyl and novocaine to numb the site of the incision, but Levinson was awake for the entire two-hour surgery, guided into a trance by Engle’s soothing voice.
“It was such a pleasant experience,” Levinson says. “I loved it. If I had to have surgery again, I would do it again.”
Hypnosedation is part of a growing trend in medicine to avoid giving people general anesthesia…
