People who regularly practice yoga relaxation techniques may reduce the inflammatory effects of stress and ageing on the body, responsible for heart disease, stroke, arthritis and T2 diabetes, a new study shows.
The study, done by Ohio State University researchers and reported in the January 2010 edition of the Journal of Psychosomatic Medicine, showed that women who routinely practiced yoga had lower amounts of the cytokine interleukin-6 (IL-6) in their blood, a stress marker also associated with aging, believed to contribute to inflammatory diseases such as heart disease, stroke and arthritis as well as T2 diabetes and other debilitating conditions.
Reducing inflammation may provide substantial short- and long-term health benefits, including lowering the risks associated with these diseases
As well as their own reduced IL-6 levels, the women who took part in the yoga study showed smaller increases in IL-6 after stressful experiences than did women who were the same age and weight but who were not yoga practitioners.
Stress Sessions Combated with Yoga Poses
Fifty women, average age 41, took part in the three fortnightly sessions for the study. They were divided into “novices,” who had previously done no more than six to 12 yoga sessions, and “experts,” who practiced yoga one of two times weekly for at least two years and at least twice weekly for the last year.
Each session began with participants filling out questionnaires and completing psychological tests to gauge mood and anxiety levels.
They then performed tasks designed to raise their stress levels, such as immersing a foot into extremely cold water for a minute, and then trying to solve a series of successively more difficult mathematics problems without paper or pencil.
Following these “stressors,” participants would either do a yoga session, a slow walk on a treadmill or watch neutral, rather boring videos. The treadmill and video tasks were designed as contrast conditions to the yoga session.
Blood samples were analysed after the study, showing that the “novices” had 41 percent higher levels of the pro-inflammatory cytokine IL-6 than the study’s “experts.” However, they also showed smaller increases in IL-6 after stressful experiences than did women of the same age and weight who were not yoga practitioners.
The "experts," having done yoga regularly for two years, were better able to limit their stress responses than the novices, lead author of the paper, Dr Janice Kiecolt-Glaser explained.
Relaxation Effects of Yoga Demonstrated
Co-author Lisa Christian, an assistant professor of psychology, psychiatry and obstetrics and gynaecology, said one possible explanation of the lower IL-6 levels was that the yoga poses were chosen from ones thought to be restorative or relaxing.
The relaxation benefits of yoga exercises were considered in another study 18 months ago, when a group of researchers from Harvard Medical School, led by Dr Herbert Benson, Mind/Body Medical Institute Associate Professor and Director Emeritus of the Benson-Henry Institute, compared the health benefits to people who regularly practiced relaxation compared to people who did none.
The researchers discovered that, in long-term practitioners of relaxation methods such as yoga and meditation, far more "disease-fighting genes" were active than in people who did no relaxation.
In particular, genes that protect from pain, infertility, high blood pressure and rheumatoid arthritis were switched on by what the researchers called "the relaxation effect."
Daily Relaxation Exercises Increases Serotonin Levels
Participants in the Harvard study were asked to practice yoga or some other form of relaxation every day.
After two months, even those who had not practiced relaxation regularly before the study started to notice the benefits as their disease fighting genes switched on.
As well as lowering the stress chemicals of adrenalin, cortisol, and Interleukin-6, relaxation is believed to increase levels of feel-good chemicals such as serotonin and of the growth hormone which repairs cells and tissue.
Results of this and other studies into relaxation and health problems are listed on the Benson Henry Institute website.
Daily Yoga Relaxation an Easy Way to Improve Health
One of the contributors to the Ohio study, Dr. Ron Glaser, professor of molecular virology, immunology and medical genetics, said it had a message for people concerned about their health.
“We know that inflammation plays a major role in many diseases,” he said. “Yoga appears to be a simple and enjoyable way to add an intervention that might reduce risks for developing heart disease, diabetes and other age-related diseases.
“This is an easy thing people can do to help reduce their risks of illness.”
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Sue Cartledge - I'm a science, health, nutrition and lifestyle journalist, fascinated by the way the physical world operates in all its forms, and how ...
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