Paradoxical therapy in conversion disorder

Abstract

Paradoxical therapy consists of suggesting that the patient intentionally engages in the unwanted behaviour, such as performing complusive ritual or bringing on a conversion attack. In this study paradoxical intention (Pl) was used with to half of the patients with conversion disorders, while the other half were treated with diazepam in order to examine the efficiency of the PI versus diazepam in conversion disorder. Patients treated with PI appeared to have a greater improvement rate for anxiety scores (z=2.43, p<0.0015) and conversion symp-toms (t=2.27, p=0.034) than those treated with anxiolytics.