Complementary approaches: mind-body medicine
Mind-body medicine typically focuses on intervention strategies that are thought to promote health, such as relaxation, hypnosis, visual imagery, meditation, yoga, biofeedback, tai chi, qi gong, cognitive-behavioral therapies, group support, autogenic training and spirituality.
Mind-body techniques, including the ones listed below, can help reduce a persons’ stress. Because stress is proven to trigger psoriasis in some people, these techniques may be helpful in controlling psoriasis.
Meditation
In meditation, a person learns to focus their attention and suspend the stream of thoughts that normally occupy the mind. This practice is believed to result in a state of greater physical relaxation, mental calmness, and psychological balance. Practicing meditation can change how a person relates to the flow of emotions and thoughts in their mind.
Support groups
Support group members provide each other with various types of help, usually nonprofessional, for a specific shared condition. The help may take the form of providing and evaluating information, sharing personal experiences, listening to and accepting others' experiences, providing sympathetic understanding and finding social networks. A support group may also work to inform the public or engage in advocacy. Learn more about support groups through the National Psorisis Foundation.
Cognitive-behavioral therapy
Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) is based on the idea that our thoughts cause our feelings and behaviors, not external issues, such as people or events. The advantage of this idea is that you can alter the way you think so that you feel or act better even if circumstances do not change. According to the National Association of Cognitive-Behavioral Therapists, CBT is a joint effort between therapist and client. Cognitive-behavioral therapists help clients learn what they want out of life and then help their clients achieve those goals. A therapist will listen, teach, and encourage, while the client expresses concerns, learns, and then implements what they have learned.