Prevention of Panic Attacks

Many patients try to avoid situations or places where they experienced a prior panic attack. They think that this is an appropriate way to prevent another panic attack.

But this is not an appropriate way to avoid further anxiety symptoms. Actually this avoidance behaviour will cause additional problems in the very near future. The patient will be frightened by the fear to get another attack (anticipatory anxiety). So he or she will monitor his surrounding in a very selective and inappropriate way to exclude all possible dangers of triggers of anxiety. This causes a lot of new fear and stress, so the overall level of stress will increase and the chance to get another panic attack will actually be much higher!

The best way to prevent new panic attacks is to go for a professional psychotherapeutic help. For a short term relief it might be good to consult a doctor and discuss pharmacotherapy options (e.g. SSRI or sometimes for a limited time anxiolytic drugs).

You can also try to lower your personal level of stress. There are different ways to achieve this goal. If you are familiar with relaxation techniques (including yoga, muscle relaxation or any other kind of relaxation) try to include this relaxation in your daily schedule. Excercise (swimming, cycling, walking) can be very useful! Try to avoid alcohol, illegal drugs, too much nicotine and coffeine. It is also important to learn to breath in a good way. A panic attack can be triggered by an unbalance of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the blood witch can be caused by e.g. hyper ventilating. A good way to stabilize the oxygen balance in the blood is a breathing technique where you calmly count to four while you breath in, hold your breath while you count to four again and then exhale while again counting to four. This technique can be used when you feel the onset of an attack to lessen it's strength.

Always remember that a panic attaci is not dangerous, you will not die, go crazy or lose controll. The best way to handle More about the treatment of anxiety attacks.