Can hypochondria be cured?
The hypochondria is a disease that unlike other diseases or conditions is not given by symptoms - so to speak - real, but rather the patient has an exaggerated concern for his health.
This means that for anything such as a mole, a spot on your body or a change of color in your skin, the one who suffers from hypochondria may think that he suffers from a terminal illness and removes imaginary diseases with objective and empirical lack.
Explained in another way: the person suffering from hypochondria believes that he suffers from a serious disease or pathology, always in an unfounded way. That is, he feels worry and fear about a disease that may suffer at those times, or that may suffer in the future.
Hypochondria is usually associated with high anxiety, and those who suffer from it commonly meditate on its symptoms, whether real or imagined, becoming aware of functional signs that normally escape consciousness.
Next we will check if hypochondria can be cured, what it is, its symptoms and treatments.
What does it consist of?
Hypochondria is an attitude that the individual adopts in the face of possible illnesses that he may have at any time in his life. The hypochondriac person is often subjected to a thorough and preoccupied analysis, done by himself, it could even be said obsessively, of his basic physiological functions.
In fact the essential characteristic so that hypochondria of place in an individual is the worry and fear to suffer a serious illness, or rather, to have the conviction of having a serious illness, from the corporal sensation or another sign that appears in the body.
Examples of these signs in hypochondriacs could be such as moles, small wounds, coughs, even heart beats, involuntary movements or not very clear physical sensations.
Before any "abnormal" sign in the body, they will feel that they suffer from a disease, although doctors assure them that they do not present any disease, the worry usually comes back again.
Even individuals suffering from hypochondria can form psychosomatic phenomena, that is, cause an organic injury that is caused by a psychological origin, hypochondria can also affect the members of a family, making them feel they are sick by any kind of details or sensations in their bodies.
What are its signs and signals
The main signs and symptoms that appear in a person suffering from hypochondria can be listed below:
- Exaggerated health concern, giving rise to symptoms, real or imagined.
- Fear of serious illness.
- Conviction of suffering from a serious illness.
- Depression.
- Real pain caused by psychological reasons, which makes the patient believe that he is seriously ill, which creates a vicious circle.
- Observation of supposed imaginary symptoms that really has nothing to do with the diseases that you think you suffer from.
It can be cured?
The use of psychotropic drugs is frequently used at the beginning of the treatment to control the anxious symptoms that the patient suffers, in parallel, it is possible and advisable to use a cognitive-behavioral psychological therapy, in which the loss of anguish and the fear of the diseases that the hypochondriac feels.
The patient with hypochondriasis is told not to go to the doctor's office or the hospital emergency department anymore and does not talk about health or illness, and the family is told to help the patient, indicating that they have an illness severe, but not what he indicates to possess, if not hypochondria, and that should help him in the best possible way.
The use of hyperbaric oxygen therapy has shown that patients suffering from hypochondriac disorder show improvement. However, patients are the ones who keep pace and frequency of sessions.
One of the basic treatments is to lose the fear of illness and death. Since the patient feels an unpleasant and uncontrollable sensation to the idea of being sick, imaginary situations are made where the patient imagines being in feared and avoided states, so the patient approaches them without anguish or fear.
The patient after this treatment can begin to reinterpret his bodily sensations and also feel those that are pleasant or neutral and his body ceases to be a source of pain or fear and can become a generator of pleasure and confidence.
Then we work so that the patient can successfully face other problems that appear in their daily lives: difficult decisions, work changes, separations, deaths and other situations that if not handled correctly by the patient may fall again in depression and therefore hypochondria. This article is published for informational purposes only.It can not and should not replace the consultation with a Psychologist. We advise you to consult your trusted Psychologist.