A psychoeducational approach to hypochondriasis: background, content, and practice guidelines

Patients suffering from health anxiety are difficult to engage in a psychological treatment, although it has now been empirically established that cognitive behavioral treatments are beneficial for many of these patients. A first important step is to change their orientation from a biomedical to a biopsychosocial perspective. One way of promoting this change is to provide focused psychoeducation. A number of studies have shown that group psychoeducation for patients with health anxiety results in a reduction concerns, depression, and medical services utilization. The purpose of this paper is to describe background, content, and implementation of a brief course entitled "Coping With Health Anxiety." The empirical support as well as the potentially active ingredients of this approach are discussed.