Coding (therapy)

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Coding (also known as the Dovzhenko method) is a catch-all term for various Russian and post-Soviet alternative therapeutic methods used to treat addictions, in which the therapist attempts to scare patients into abstinence from a substance they are addicted to by convincing them that they will be harmed or killed if they use it again. Each method involves the therapist pretending to insert a "code" into patients' brains that will ostensibly provoke a strong adverse reaction should it come into contact with the addictive substance. The methods use a combination of theatrics, hypnosis, placebos, and drugs with temporary adverse effects to instill the erroneous beliefs. Therapists may pretend to "code" patients for a fixed length of time, such as five years. Coding was created by Aleksandr Dovzhenko, a Soviet and Ukrainian psychiatrist.