What is a Hypnotherapist? Alternative Health Care Professional
This is a common question from individuals encountering the profession for the first time. While the media has increasingly presented the virtues of hypnosis for a wide variety of applications, rarely do they make the distinction between a Hypnotherapist and other health care professionals.
Many people assume that a Hypnotherapist must be a Psychologist or Medical Doctor. Hypnotherapist however, is a profession in and of itself whose scope and preparation is quite different from these other professions.
Only the Medical Doctor is recognized by the State to diagnose and treat medical disorders. Medical disorders can be defined as any symptom with a possible medical etiology; such as headaches, backaches, blurred vision, etc.
The Psychologist is the professional trained to diagnose and treat emotional and mental disorders, If medical disorders are the domain of the Medical Doctor and emotional and mental disorders the scope of the psychologist, what then is the domain of the Hypnotherapist?
The answer is technically called vocational and avocational self improvement. In simple language, these are things that do not qualify as a medical disorder or an emotional and mental disorder. In the scope of the health services, these are the little things. But it is the little things that the majority of Americans are struggling with.
In this country, two thirds of the adult population are overweight, one third smoke cigarettes and 70 percent suffer from some form of insomnia. It is probably even safe to say that 95 percent of the people you know would like to improve in some area or another. Sports performance, confidence, motivation and more are all the specialty of the Hypnotherapist.
Unlike Psychologists and Medical Doctors, the Hypnotherapist is the only professional specifically trained to work in these areas. In fact, the HMI graduate has more hours, length and depth of training in hypnotherapy than any other health care professional.