Already known to help reduce blood pressure, transcendental
meditation has now been found to help with a cluster of
other symptoms which can lead to heart attacks, a study
found.
A 16-week trial of patients with
heart disease found that those who practiced meditation
had significantly better improvements in blood pressure,
glucose and insulin levels and a more stable functioning
of the autonomic nervous system than those who were entered
in a standard health education program.
"These physiological effects were accomplished without
changes in body weight, medication, or psychosocial variables
and despite a marginally statistically significant increase
in physical activity in the health education (control) group,"
lead author Maura Paul-Labrador of Cedars-Sinai Medical
Center in Los Angeles wrote.
The study was published in the Journal
of the American Medical Association's Archives of
Internal Medicine.
Transcendental meditation is derived from the ancient
Vedic tradition in India and is taught through a standard
protocol involving lectures, personal instruction and group
meetings. Patients in the trial attended lectures, group
meetings and individual classes and were also instructed
to practice the relaxation technique at home.
The study showed that meditation could be a good form
of prevention and treatment for heart disease but also helped
explain the role of stress in the rising epidemic of a cluster
of symptoms that increase cardiac risk, the authors concluded.
That cluster is referred to as metabolic syndrome and
includes high blood pressure (hypertension), abdominal obesity,
high cholesterol and insulin resistance, which occurs when
the body is unable to use the insulin produced by the pancreas
to process sugar into energy.
"Although current low levels of physical activity,
unhealthy eating habits and resultant obesity are triggers
for this epidemic, the demands of modern society may also
be responsible for higher levels of chronic stress,"
the authors wrote.
Such stress causes the release of cortisol and other hormones
and neurotransmitters, which over time damage the cardiovascular
system.
"Our results, demonstrating beneficial physiological
effects of transcendental meditation in the absence of effects
on psychosocial variables, suggest that transcendental meditation
may modulate response to stress rather than alter the stress
itself, similar to the physiological impact of exercise
conditioning," the authors wrote.
