28/06/2025
Day 2 of 56th Annual Conference for Psychotherapy Research.
I presented my work on claustrophobia during radiotherapy of head and neck cancer and slow breathwork intervention. Radiotherapy mask may be triggering, it pins down the patient to radiotherapy bed, so there is a complete forced immobilisation. Even up to 20% of head and neck cancer patients experience panic attacks and claustrophobic reactions during the whole process. Slow breathwork methods caused a rapid improvement ( median up to 2 sessions). The abstract is below
Slow Rhythmic Breathing as an Effective Adjunct to the Psychotherapy of Claustrophobia and Trauma In Head And Neck Cancer.
Alicja Heyda, Krzysztof Składowski,
Aim
Slow rhythmic breathwork (SRB) methods are known for their beneficial effects in regulating nervous system. Head and neck cancer (HNC) and its treatment often cause facial disfigurement, pain, speech problems, and depression. The radiotherapy mask that connects the patient to radiotherapy bed might trigger panic and claustrophobic reaction. The purpose of this study is to evaluate how SRB affected heavily distressed HNC patients, whose trauma could have prevented them from completing cancer treatment.
Methods
Thirty patients with HNC the ages between 43-76 who started radical radiotherapy or chemoradiotherapy received psychotherapy with SRB as an adjunct breathwork intervention after reporting claustrophobia preventing them from starting/continuing cancer treatment. Previous trauma was reported (90%) in total, 33% of the group was treated for mental health problems, 63% were also diagnosed with pre-existing psychiatric comorbidities ( PTSD -13%, mood disorders- 33% and addiction – 17%).Patients had 15-30 minutes of daily breathwork, including box breathing (57%), coherent breathing – 6 breaths per minute (93%) and sometimes accompanied with other circular breathing styles (26%), followed by free verbal expression.
Results
All patients completed cancer treatment and reported a fast significant clinical improvement in claustrophobia and distress, after a median of 2 sessions (1-10). Totally, the median of sessions was 5 (1-23); 27% needed a sedative during the first 1-3 fractions of radiotherapy.
Discussion
SRB effectively reduced the symptoms of claustrophobia and anxiety. Breathwork was shown to the be an effective adjunct to psychotherapy process of traumatised HNC patients.
Keywords: slow rhythmic breathing, 6 breaths per minute, box breathing, psychotherapy, head and neck cancer, claustrophobia, trauma
