Mind-body therapies for functional bowel disorders-A review of recent clinical trials

IntroductionFunctional bowel disorders (FBDs) significantly affect a person's daily life; however, because their diagnosis is mostly based on symptom presentation, time to diagnosis is long. This delay in diagnosis remains true even when other methods, such as biochemical parameters, immunogenic and inflammatory markers, are used to differentiate the type of disorder. As treatment approaches are mainly symptom-based and often result in suboptimal outcomes, mind-body therapies may offer benefits either used alone or in combination with pharmacological treatments.MethodologyThus, the purposes of this article are to: (1) describe the scientific knowledge based on currently available clinical trials of mind-body therapies for FBDs, (2) examine potential benefits of using such therapies and, (3) provide recommendations regarding their clinical application in the treatment of FBDs. The literature search covered the last decade from June 2002 to June 2012 and resulted in a total of 19 original research articles that met the inclusion criteria. The four common mind-body therapies, which include yoga, hypnotherapy, cognitive behavioral therapy, and biofeedback, were examined in this article.ConclusionThe heterogeneity of clinical study designs as well as the wide disparity in defining primary outcome variables often limits the comparison of studies on the same mind-body therapy. Overall findings of these studies were promising, but not conclusive, and further recommendations for the research direction of mind-body therapies are proposed.