Effectiveness of Mindfulness in Decreasing the Anxiety and Depression of Patients Suffering from Irritable Bowel Syndrome

Background: Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a functional disorder of thelower gastrointestinal (GI) tract caused by stress and is also is associated withanxiety and depression which may benefit from a treatment such asmindfulness.Objectives: to determine the effectiveness of the mindfulness in decreasing theanxiety and depression in the patients suffering from IBS.Methods: The research design was based on single-subject. Three IBS patientsdiagnosed by Rome-II criteria participated in this treatment project in Tabriz in2015 voluntarily and with their personal consent. Eight sessions ofMindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) were held for them individually.Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) and Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II) wereused before starting the treatment and at the end of the second, fourth, sixth andeighth sessions regarding to their intensity of anxiety and depression.Results: The anxiety and the depression scores of each subject were decreasedin post-test comparing with pre-test. The percentage of the three patients remission regarding to the anxiety by BAI were 86.67, 56.52 and 70.59 percentand the remission percentage average was 65.25. The percentage of remissionregarding to the depression by BDI-II were 35.29, 65.12, 95.24 respectively,and the average percentage of the remission was 57.14.Conclusion: Based on the research findings, the treatment education andMBSR had the positive impact on decreasing the anxiety and e depression ofthe patients suffering from IBS.

کلیدواژه ها:

Mindfulness ، Anxiety ، Depression ، Irritable Bowel Syndrome