App or therapist? A new IBS trial compared hypnotherapy both ways
A 230-person trial in Gut tested self-guided smartphone hypnotherapy against sessions with a therapist.
Why this trial matters
Hypnotherapy is already a recommended, evidence-based therapy for IBS. The problem is access: trained therapists are scarce and sessions cost money. An app could reach far more people, but only if it works well enough. This trial, published in Gut in July 2026, tested that head on.[1]
How the trial was set up
The researchers randomly assigned 230 people with IBS (Rome IV criteria, aged 16 to 75; average age 38, 70% women) to one of three 12-week programs:[1]
- Hypnotherapy in person with a therapist. The trial registration describes this as six individual sessions, one every two weeks.[2]
- Self-guided hypnotherapy delivered through a smartphone.
- Self-guided online psychoeducation about IBS, as a comparison.
The main outcome was the FDA definition of an abdominal pain response: at least a 30% drop in weekly worst daily pain, in at least two of the four follow-up weeks. The trial was designed to test whether the app was “non-inferior”, meaning no more than 10 percentage points worse than the therapist.
People with an abdominal pain response
Share of each group meeting the FDA abdominal pain response definition.
View the data table
| Group / comparison | Value (%) |
|---|---|
| In-person hypnotherapy | 48 |
| Smartphone hypnotherapy | 33 |
| Online psychoeducation | 22 |
What the results say
The app trailed the therapist by 14.7 percentage points. The 95% confidence interval ran from 29.3 points worse to 0.9 points better, so the trial could not show the app was close enough to count as equivalent.[1]
Against education, the picture is better for both. At week 16 the abstract reports in-person hypnotherapy as clearly more effective than education. At the six-month follow-up, both hypnotherapy groups were more effective than education. Neither form of hypnotherapy changed psychological symptoms (such as anxiety or depression) more than education did.[1]
What this means if you have IBS
- If you can get hypnotherapy with a trained therapist, this trial suggests it is the stronger choice.
- If you can’t, a structured self-guided program is a reasonable alternative that did better than education alone over six months.
- Get an IBS diagnosis from a doctor first. Symptoms like weight loss, bleeding, or anemia need medical checks, not hypnosis.
Where Hypnova fits
Hypnova was not the app in this trial, and it is not a gut-directed IBS protocol. These response rates belong to the programs that were tested. For more on the gut-directed approach and the earlier IMAGINE trial, see our guide to hypnosis for IBS.
Sources and further reading
- Snijkers et al. — In-person therapist-delivered hypnotherapy versus smartphone-based self-guided hypnotherapy in IBS: a multicentre three-armed randomised controlled trial
Gut, published online July 25, 2026. DOI: 10.1136/gutjnl-2026-338385. Figures in this article come from the published abstract; we did not have access to the full text.
- ClinicalTrials.gov — FORTITUDE trial registration (NCT03899779)
Lead sponsor: Maastricht University Medical Center. Describes the in-person arm as six individual sessions every two weeks over 12 weeks.
Evidence checked September 25, 2026. This is an editorial research summary by the Hypnova team, not a systematic review or a clinical assessment. Cited studies evaluate their own interventions; they do not establish that Hypnova produces the same outcomes. This article is educational and does not replace individualized care.
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