Stress responses that adversely impact all body systems, including cardiovascular, respiratory, endocrine, and immune systems can be decreased with meditation. Meditation effectively lowers the body"s responsiveness to the stress hormone norepinephrine. Normally, stress triggers the release of this hormone, which in turn causes heart rate and blood pressure to rise.

Meditation reduces factors that contribute to the cause or progression of heart failure, such as metabolic syndrome, left ventricular hypertrophy (enlargement of the heart) and severity of arteriosclerosis (hardening of the arteries).

Meditation can be beneficial for various diseases and ailments such as fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, headaches, arthritis, and asthma. Health benefits of meditation include: Improved concentration, increased energy, reduced stress, lowered blood pressure, slower respiratory rate, and prevention of illness. Meditation is primarily utilized for health maintenance purposes but may be tailored for curative intervention.

Meditation reduces the brain"s response to pain by producing a physiological state capable of modifying various kinds of pain. Meditation produces a fundamental change in how the brain functions rather than simply an attitudinal change. Biochemical compounds in the blood indicative of stress can be reduced with meditation. Meditation can stabilize these changes over time, so that an individual is actually less stressed biochemically during daily activity.

Transcendental Meditation (TM), a widely practiced stress-reducing meditation technique, significantly decreases the severity of congestive heart failure. A recent study from the University of Pennsylvania"s Division of Geriatric Medicine evaluated 23 men and women, average age 64, who were recently hospitalized with New York Heart Association class II or III congestive heart failure. Participants were randomized to either the Transcendental Meditation technique or health education in addition to standard medical care.

Changes in heart function were measured with a six-minute walk test and additional measures were evaluated for quality of life, depression and re-hospitalizations. Changes in outcomes from baseline to three and six months after treatment were also analyzed. According to Ravishankar Jayadevappa, Ph.D., lead author, the TM group significantly improved on the six-minute walk test after both three and six months of TM practice compared to the control group.

The TM group also showed improvements in quality of life measurements, depression and had fewer re-hospitalizations. "The results indicate that TM can be effective in improving the functional capacity and quality of life of congestive heart failure patients. These results also suggest long-term improvements in survival in these individuals," said Jayadevappa. TM most likely improves heart functioning by reducing sympathetic nervous system activation associated with stress that is known to contribute to the failing heart, according to the authors.

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