EDUCATING THE WORRIED WELL - DESCRIPTION OF A STRUCTURED PROGRAM AND IMPLICATIONS FOR TREATMENT AND PREVENTION

This paper describes the contents of a cognitive-behavioural treatment for hypochondriasis and health anxiety based on Barsky et al.'s (1988 ) proposal. Five types of factors that may account for the enhanced ex perience of physical symptoms-selective and inadequate attention, musc le tension and bad breathing, environmental factors, stress and dyspho ric mood and misinterpretation of somatic symptoms-were presented in t he form of a group of educational training. Special emphasis was given to the form in which psychological information should be provided to initially resistant patients and to the contexts in which training sho uld occur. The evidence obtained with an heterogeneous group of 14 sub jects supports the utility of the programme, not only for target behav iours, but also for other related areas. Finally, the implications of this type of intervention for treatment and prevention are discussed. (C) 1997 by John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.