Picture this. A patient has a metal plate removed from his forearm. No general anesthesia. No painkillers. Just hypnosis. That is exactly what happened in 2018 at Hirslanden Klinik St. Anna in Lucerne, Switzerland, documented in the Swiss public TV program “Puls.” The patient felt no significant pain during or after the operation. The surgical team was visibly stunned. And researchers at the University of Zurich started asking what was really happening in the brain during moments like this.
Seven years later, the question has answers. And on June 20 and 21, 2026, the international hypnosis community will meet in Winterthur, Switzerland, to talk about exactly that.
What hypnosis actually is
Many people still picture hypnosis as a stage performer making volunteers cluck like chickens. Or as something mystical, esoteric, hard to pin down. Both miss the point. Hypnosis is neither secret nor a stage trick. It is a deeply natural state in which the conscious and the subconscious mind cooperate differently than in everyday life.
Hypnosis has nothing to do with sleep, either. Quite the opposite. A hypnotized person is not drifting away. They are highly focused. Deeply relaxed and clearly awake at the same time. That was exactly the headline the University of Zurich used in February 2025 when reporting on its research: deeply relaxed and at the same time focused.
What the University of Zurich measured
Three studies. One shared design. One ambition: not just to experience hypnosis, but to measure it. The neuroscientists Philipp Stämpfli, Nuno Prates de Matos and Mike Brügger, together with their team at the MR Center of the Psychiatric University Hospital Zurich and the Psychological Institute of the University of Zurich, were the first in the world to investigate two distinct hypnotic depths using a multimodal approach.
The fMRI study (de Matos et al., 2023, Frontiers in Human Neuroscience) demonstrates measurable changes in functional brain networks during two distinct hypnotic states. The EEG study (Niedernhuber et al., 2024, Cortex), a collaboration between Cambridge and the University of Zurich, identifies an interhemispheric frontoparietal network that supports hypnotic states. And the MRS study (de Matos et al., 2024, Scientific Reports) provides the first-ever evidence of neurochemical changes during hypnosis. In deep hypnosis, myo-inositol concentration rises significantly in the parieto-occipital region.
The sober conclusion, in the researchers’ own words: hypnosis really does change something in the brain. Hypnotic effects are not “made up” or acted. And there is more than one depth of hypnosis. Both points had been debated in academic circles for decades. Now the data is on the table.
Three patterns that show up in clinical practice
People who walk into a hypnotherapy office rarely come because of neurochemistry. They come with a specific concern. Three patterns show up especially often.
First, pain and anxiety. The Geneva University Hospitals integrate hypnosis alongside conventional care, in burn units, in dentistry, in pediatric procedures. Studies like Montgomery et al. (2007) show that hypnosis significantly reduces anxiety and pain in breast surgery patients.
Second, psychosomatic complaints. Irritable bowel, migraine, insomnia, chronic tension. Conditions where body and mind are clearly talking to each other and no one is listening. Hypnosis opens an entry point to the subconscious, where many of these patterns originate.
Third, blocking experiences from the past. Test anxiety, fear of failure, the sense of standing next to your own life. The core OMNI principle is “Regress to Cause and fix it.” Go back to the root, sort it out, integrate. Not numb the symptom, but resolve the cause.
What makes the OMNI method different
OMNI has deep roots. Dave Elman, one of the most influential hypnosis teachers of the 20th century, pulled hypnosis out of the stage corner and brought it into medicine and therapy. His student Gerald F. Kein founded OMNI Hypnosis Training Center in DeLand, Florida, in 1979. Since 2015 the company has been Swiss-owned. Hansruedi Wipf, President of OMNI Hypnosis International, came from the automotive industry and brought a word with him that you rarely heard in this field before: process. In the same year he had the OMNI training certified according to ISO 9001. That is still unique in hypnotherapy training worldwide.
Hansruedi likes to talk about the “democratization of hypnosis.” He does not mean that everyone should be allowed to do everything. He means that the knowledge should be accessible, without mysticism, without esoterics, with clear standards. Adrian BrĂĽngger, CEO of OMNI Hypnosis International and an EHF Master Coach, used to be a skeptic himself. Today he coaches elite athletes with the same tools. Both share the same stance: results before methodology folklore.
Exactly this stance is what students learn in OMNI hypnotherapy training. Physicians, dentists, nurses, coaches, psychologists, career changers. The program is structured to fit alongside a working career and is available across Switzerland, Germany, Austria and online for international students. Graduates who want to go deeper find the next step in OMNI Prime Mentoring.
What you can do now
If you carry a concern that hypnotherapy might help with, hypnosis.info has a therapist directory of more than 20,000 certified OMNI graduates worldwide, across 50+ locations in 20 countries. Find someone near you.
If you want to learn hypnosis yourself, because you want to add a serious tool to your professional practice, because the topic has kept circling back to you for years, or because you want to support transformation honestly, OMNI hypnotherapy training is the direct path. The International Hypnosis Congress on June 20 and 21, 2026, at the AXA Arena in Winterthur is the best place to meet the people doing this work every day. More on hypnosekongress.net.
Bottom line
Hypnosis is not sleep. Not a stage trick. Not esoteric. It is measurable, it is learnable, and it produces results where symptoms have their cause in the subconscious. Hypnosis is no miracle, but with hypnosis, miracles become possible. If you want to know more, start with a click on hypnosis.info, or come to Winterthur in June.
Sources
- University of Zurich News: Deeply relaxed and at the same time focused (Blöchlinger, February 2025, in German)
- de Matos et al. (2023): Investigating functional brain connectivity patterns associated with two hypnotic states, Frontiers in Human Neuroscience
- de Matos et al. (2024): Neurochemical dynamics during two hypnotic states, Scientific Reports
- Niedernhuber et al. (2024): An interhemispheric frontoparietal network supports hypnotic states, Cortex
- Montgomery et al. (2007): A randomized clinical trial of a brief hypnosis intervention to control side effects in breast surgery patients, Journal of the National Cancer Institute
- International Hypnosis Congress 2026, AXA Arena Winterthur
