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Psychomedical help is about psychological influences on physical disease. What contributes to sickness, what helps to heal? Marco de Vries and I studied people with Spontaneous Regression of Cancer (Schilder et al., 2004).
We learned from these people that getting access to essential activities and experiences may have caused their healing. The actual realisation of essential activities and experiences was the most precise start of the clinical improvement. In two patients a religious event was seen prior to healing. Van Baalen and De Vries earlier had observed a change toward personal autonomy, social support and meaning. Ikemi, a Japanese investigator of spontaneous regression of cancer, called it an 'existential shift'. Roud and Weinstock had similar observations.
De Vries and us studied if psychotherapy could affect cancer (De Vries et al., 1997) . In some patients tumorgrowth halted, for three months up and till two years. Some other studies observed double survival following psychotherapy; some however did not. Experiential therapy seems more promising than cognitive behavioral, that's what we've seen so far. A review of psycho-oncology research is available here: Introduction into Psycho-Oncology. Psychodrama is a very promising technique in oncology. A short introduction can be found here: Psychodrama and cancer.
These connections not only hold true for cancer. Clearly, it is worthwile to explore which elements of one's life may influence any other physical disease. Current techniques in experiential psychotherapy come even deeper and further than cognitive behavioral appoaches. This holds true for diagnostic elements (what went wrong? where's the flavour?) and therapeutic corrective actions (what can we do about it).
Exploring the dimensions of life, feelings and personality is like starting to live, even in the face of death. Or it is humerous and challenging, even with frightening cancer or serious heart disease. And when it is sad and tearful, a face may become more radiant and decisive. 'The experience of disconnection is reconnection', as Yeomans has put it. And from reconnection come life, will, desire, feeling and expression, autonomy and relationships. In the language of dreams, ice melts and water starts to flow.
