Health Sense: Is Yoga Just a Crock?

[Guest guest]

Interesting reading for all of us--happy spleens!!

ananda

 

 

Health Sense: Is Yoga Just a Crock?

By Judy Foreman

I have been standing on my head, off and on, for about 35 years now,

as well as sitting cross-legged breathing through one nostril at a

time, and -- my favorite -- lying flat on my back, utterly relaxed,

in the so-called " corpse pose. " I am, in other words, one of the 15

million Americans who, according to a Harris Interactive Service Poll

done in 2003 for Yoga Journal, have fallen in love with this ancient

Indian practice that's part meditation, part exercise. To the

cognoscenti -- and our numbers grew by nearly 29 percent between 2002

and 2003, according to the poll -- yoga is a pleasant practice that

seems to enhance physical and emotional strength, flexibility and

balance.

But does it?

Well, to the extent that yoga overlaps with the so-called " relaxation

response, " it's no leap at all to conclude that yoga is good for you.

The " relaxation response, " a term coined years ago by Dr. Herbert

Benson, president of the Mind/Body Medical Institute in Boston,

Mass., consists basically of quieting the mind and body through

prayer, contemplation or focusing on something simple, like

breathing.

The relaxation response has been shown to lower blood pressure, heart

rate and respiration; to reduce anxiety, anger, hostility and mild-to-

moderate depression; to help alleviate insomnia, premenstrual

syndrome, hot flashes and infertility; and some types of pain, like

tension headaches.

But for yoga itself, there's not much scientific evidence that the

practice confers its own specific health benefits -- though that

doesn't seem to dampen anyone's enthusiasm, including my own.

" There is not enough really good research to draw strong conclusions

about anything about yoga, " said California-based health psychologist

and yoga teacher Roger Cole.

Take standing on your head. There is some data suggesting that

inversion may slow heart rate and make people secrete less of a

stress hormone, norepinephrine. " The question, " said Cole, " is

whether that amounts to clinical benefits. " Some yoga teachers say

that standing on your head increases blood flow to the brain, a

supposedly good thing. That's nonsense, said Dr. Timothy McCall, a

physician and yogi who writes a health column for Yoga Journal.

" Blood flow to the brain is tightly regulated, " he said, so going

upside down probably doesn't bathe the brain in extra blood. And

standing on your head could worsen glaucoma (increased pressure

within the eye) and or problems with the retina. That said, McCall is

still convinced that headstands " have a profound effect on slowing

the body down. " McCall, who perhaps more than anyone else has tried

to assess the science of yoga, has visited research institutes in

India, where most of the yoga studies are being done. Though some of

the research -- both in India and in the West --is methodologically

flawed, yoga has more than 50 documented effects, including improved

strength, increased flexibility, better balance, better cholesterol

levels and better mood.

Of five studies on asthma since 1985, three showed statistically

significant benefits. One 1998 study on carpal tunnel syndrome (pain

caused by pressure on a nerve in the wrist) found yoga was associated

with reduced symptoms and improved grip strength. A couple of small

studies suggested that yoga may lead to both subjective and objective

improvements in or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, an ailment

in which the airways and air sacs in the lungs lose their elasticity.

Another small study found that the slow, diaphragmatic breathing of

yoga may increase oxygenation in some patients with congestive heart

failure. Several studies suggest yoga may improve symptoms of

coronary artery disease, though the patients also

made other changes -- like switching to low-fat diets. One study of

severe depression found that the deep breathing (pranayama) of yoga,

electric shock therapy and drugs all improved scores somewhat on a

standard depression test.

At Boston's Brigham and Women's Hospital, senior neuroscientist Sat

Bir Singh Khalsa is studying yoga as a treatment for insomnia.

At the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Dr.

Lorenzo Cohen, director of the integrative medicine program, recently

published a seven-week study of 39 men and women with lymphoma. Cohen

randomized patients to receive instruction in Tibetan yoga or no

special intervention.

Those who practiced yoga slept better than those who didn't, though

there were no differences in other measures, such as anxiety,

depression or fatigue.

Researchers at the UCLA Jonsson Cancer Center are about to start a

study of yoga to combat fatigue in women with breast cancer.

Put bluntly, yoga may indeed have more health benefits than have been

documented so far. But the skimpiness of data so far means: Buyer

beware. If you're in a class and the teacher makes claims like a

certain pose will make your spleen happy -- smile serenely and think

of the claim as a metaphor.

And choose your teacher with care. Unlike hairdressers and

manicurists, yoga teachers are not licensed. A national organization

called Yoga Alliance (www.yogaalliance.org) lists teachers who have

completed various levels of training, but it provides no real

evidence of competence. Some methods of yoga, like the Iyengar

system, do have a rigorous, multitiered system of certification, said

Patricia Walden, director of the BKS Iyengar Yogamala of Cambridge,

Mass.

But it's still a crapshoot. So, good luck. And, as they say in

Sanskrit, when one person puts her palms together and offers a humble

greeting to another, Namaste.

Judy Foreman is a lecturer at Harvard Medical School.

© 2004, Judy Foreman. Distributed by Tribune Media Services

International.