News Maharishi in the World Today

How We Present
the News







  
Taking a closer look at health benefits of meditation
by Jeanne Ball

PsychCentral    Translate This Article
1 April 2014

On 27 March 2014 PsychCentral reported: Meditation research has come a long way since the first scientific study on meditation was published in a peer-reviewed journal in 1971,* reporting the discovery of a major fourth state of consciousness—the state of restful alertness—experienced during the Transcendental Meditation (TM) technique. Now there are over 1,000 published studies on various meditation practices, with over 600 studies on the TM technique alone. It is a joy for Global Good News service to feature this news, which indicates the success of the life-supporting programmes Maharishi has designed to bring fulfilment to the field of health.

''Recent press reports about a scientific review published in JAMA Internal Medicine (January 2014) raised questions about the extent of health benefits that can be claimed for meditation,'' writes Jeanne Ball in the PsychCentral article. ''While the review has been criticized as too narrowly focused to represent the current state of meditation research . . . [it] ''may prompt health professionals to look closer at meditation and discover how far the research has actually come at verifying the health benefits and specific effects of different practices.''

The article explores key aspects of this topic, for example describing the current tour of U.S. universities and medical schools by expert meditation researcher Robert Schneider, M.D., FACC, with upcoming ''grand rounds'' presentations at Yale and other major institutions, on meditation and its role in stress reduction and cardiovascular disease prevention and treatment.

''Many doctors and scientists are recognizing that mind-body-heart research has crossed a threshold,'' the article quotes Dr. Schneider as saying, noting ''the recent publication of the American Heart Association's scientific statement on alternative methods for lowering blood pressure, and the AHA's publication of a long-term clinical trial** showing that the Transcendental Meditation technique reduces rates of death, heart attack and stroke by 48 percent.''

The article mentions research findings on Transcendental Meditation, mindfulness, and other meditation techniques with comments from Dr. Schneider and other researchers including Dr. Fred Travis, noting differences among types of meditation ''in procedure, patterns of brain blood flow, brain metabolic rate and EEG signatures''. References are given for key studies.

Also featured is a 3-minute video of Dr Robert Schneider speaking on Meditation and Heart Health.

Click here to read the full article online at PsychCentral.com.

* Wallace, K. Physiological Effects of Transcendental Meditation. Science. 27, 1970167 (3926): 1751-1754.

** Schneider, R., et al. Stress Reduction in the Secondary Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease: Randomized, Controlled Trial of Transcendental Meditation and Health Education in Blacks. Circulation. 2014;129:e28-e292.

Copyright © 2014 Psych Central

Global Good News comment:

Robert Schneider, MD, FACC, is Director of the NIH-funded Institute for Natural Medicine and Prevention at Maharishi University of Management, Fairfield, Iowa, USA.

A version of this article—Transcendental Meditation: Setting the tone of our health care system—appeared 31 March in Elephant Journal.

Every day Global Good News documents the rise of a better quality of life dawning in the world and highlights the need for introducing Natural Law based—Total Knowledge based—programmes to bring the support of Nature to every individual, raise the quality of life of every society, and create a lasting state of world peace.



Translation software is not perfect; however if you would like to try it, you can translate this page using:

(Google)
(Altavista babelfish)

health news more

World News | Genetic Engineering | Education | Business | Health News

Search | Global News | Agriculture and Environmental News | Business News
Culture News | Education News | Government News | Health News
Science and Technology News | World Peace | Maharishi Programmes
Press Conferences | Transcendental Meditation | Celebration Calendars | Gifts
News by Country | News in Pictures | What's New | Modem/High Speed | RSS/XML