Hypnotherapy for chronic idiopathic nausea and functional dyspepsia in children.

BACKGROUND

Chronic idiopathic nausea (CIN) and functional dyspepsia (FD) are common disorders in children. They are associated with substantial physical and psychosocial distress, as well as school absences and decreased social functioning. The treatment of nausea in CIN and FD in pediatric patients is mostly symptomatic with patients often using prokinetics and/ or anti-emetics for years. In adults gut-directed hypnotherapy has been shown to be a promising treatment option.



AIM:

To investigate the effectiveness of gut-directed hypnotherapy (HT) for reduction of complaints of nausea in children with CIN or FD.



METHODS:

The study population consists of 100 children between 8 and 18 years clinically diagnosed with functional nausea by a paediatrician, either due to chronic idiopathic nausea or functional dyspepsia according to the Rome IV criteria.
Children will receive either 6 sessions of gut-directed HT during 3 months or SMT consisting of antiemetics and prokinetics + 6 sessions of supportive therapy during 3 months. The main outcome parameter is the number of patients with > 50% reduction of their nausea after one year follow-up. Severity and incidence of functional nausea is scored using 7-day diary cards and validated paediatric facial analogue scales for measuring nausea. The secondary outcomes include: quality of life, health utility index, depression, anxiety and somatisation, absence of school, use of health care resources and additional costs, use of medication.

Gut-directed hypnotherapy compared to standard medical treatment leads to a substantial reduction in symptoms of nausea in children clinically diagnosed with chronically idiopathic nausea and/or functional dyspepsia

Primary outcome: At 12 months follow-up.

Patients will be randomly allocated to either 6 sessions of gut-directed hypnotherapy (HT) during 3 months or standard medical treatment (SMT) consisting of antiemetics and prokinetics + 6 sessions of supportive therapy during 3 months.