Mindfulness-Based Interventions: A Coming of Age?

Mindfulness-based interventions are being reported with increasing frequency in the empirical medical literature. The increased person-centered locus of control reported in A. M. Tacón, Y. M. Caldera, and C. Ronaghan (2004) among breast cancer patients engaged in mindfulness-based stress reduction reflects a medical paradigm that empowers the individual to work with one's own stress, illness, challenges, and demands of daily living. In addition to the clinical applications of mindfulness-based interventions appearing in the literature, and the areas for further investigation and research, it is important to place these interventions in a context in which the practitioner and patients are equally engaged in the intervention. In this way, they both share in a truly participatory, biopsychosocially oriented medicine, where bidirectional healing takes place.