New Interview on Working with Addiction and Pain for the Mind & Life Podcast

I’m excited to share my recent interview with my good colleague Wendy Hasenkamp on the Mind & Life podcast!

We cover some fascinating topics including:

  • how my clinical psychotherapy practice informed my scientific research;
  • the power of mindfulness meditation to heal and restore well-being;
  • self-transcendence and non-dual states of consciousness;
  • how addiction changes reward processing and attention in the brain;
  • Mindfulness-Oriented Recovery Enhancement (MORE), and its application to treating addiction and chronic pain;
  • how reappraisal can help in difficult situations;
  • the role of savoring and reconnecting with natural rewards;
  • deconstructing pain;
  • the effects of mindfulness meditation on brain function;
  • and exciting results from a large clinical trial showing how effective MORE is, and how it might work.

Click here to listen now: https://podcast.mindandlife.org/eric-garland/ or you can subscribe to the show on Spotify or other preferred players. I hope you enjoy it!

 

New Podcast Interview on Mindfulness, Pain, and Addiction

I had a great podcast with Dr. Santosh Rao, Medical Director of the James M Cox Foundation Center for Cancer Prevention and Integrative Oncology at Banner MD Anderson for his Integrative Oncology Talk – a podcast of the Society for Integrative Oncology.

We had a fantastic conversation ranging from how chronic pain and cancer pain are distinct at the neurophysiological and psychological levels, to how mindfulness can be used to modify how pain is experienced in the brain, to the problem of opioid misuse and how it leads to inability to regulate positive and negative emotions, and finally, to how finding meaning in the face of adversity can culminate in the experience of self-transcendence – an crucial pathway to recovery. We focused heavily on my research on Mindfulness-Oriented Recovery Enhancement as well as my clinical experiences at Huntsman Cancer Institute treating cancer patients with mind-body therapies. Thanks Santosh for an excellent interview!

Next MORE Training March 5-6, 2022

The next Mindfulness-Oriented Recovery Enhancement (MORE) training will be held online via Zoom on March 5-6, 2022.

A registration link can be found here.

MORE is an evidence-based, transdiagnostic therapy that unites complementary aspects of mindfulness training, third-wave CBT, and principles from positive psychology into an integrative treatment approach for addiction, stress, and chronic pain. MORE’s therapeutic effects have been demonstrated in ten clinical trials, and the MORE research program is currently supported by more than $25 million in federal research grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Department of Defense (DOD), and the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI). Rigorous experiments have demonstrated effects of MORE on modifying neurophysiological reactivity to drug cues and natural rewards – indicating that MORE leads to therapeutic changes in the brain.

Participants receive intensive didactic and experiential instruction in implementing specialized mindfulness techniques and other clinical skills integral to Mindfulness-Oriented Recovery Enhancement (MORE). Research evidence on the MORE model will be presented, along with a review of the latest discoveries in neuroscience and basic biobehavioral science about mindfulness, addiction, and chronic pain.

Participants will practice the therapeutic techniques outlined in the MORE treatment manual (Garland, 2013) via clinical role plays. Participants will receive live supervision from Dr. Garland in the delivery of therapeutic techniques via real-time feedback to optimize the delivery of the MORE intervention.

Unique mind-body therapy techniques, advanced cognitive-behavioral skills, and strategies from positive psychology will be presented to address common clinical problems including:

  • Craving and unhealthy habit behaviors
  • Physical and emotional pain
  • Catastrophizing and rumination
  • Stress reactivity and anhedonia

At the completion of the training workshop, participants will have a basic level of competency to use the MORE treatment manual to implement MORE for persons suffering from addictive behaviors and chronic pain conditions.

Training in MORE is provided at institutions of higher education, government agencies, academic teaching hospitals, and medical centers. To date, Dr. Garland has provided training in MORE to >475 clinicians from a range of settings, including Johns Hopkins Medical School (Maryland), Mt. Sinai Hospital (New York), Essentia Health (Minnesota, Wisconsin, and North Dakota), Medical University of South Carolina (South Carolina), Intermountain Healthcare (Utah), Southwest Care Center (New Mexico), New Roads Behavioral Health (Utah), Philadelphia Veterans Affairs Medical Center (Pennsylvania), Neuroscience Associates of New York (New York), Triangle Options for Substance Abusers (North Carolina), the University of Zurich (Switzerland), among others.

The cost of the training is $500 for 13 NASW-approved CEUs (with a 20% discount for graduate students). Register here.