In "Healing Mind, Healing Body," Tricycle Magazine gives a short excerpt from Jon Kabat-Zinn's book, Coming to Our Senses, about a case study on how mindfulness practice can aid medical treatment. The story describes how Kabat-Zinn became involved with a study on the positive aspects of meditation with psoriasis patients at the University of Massachusetts Department of Medicine in the early 1980s.
After meeting with Jeff Bernhard, the chief of dermatology at the university, the two decided to test the effects of meditation on healing psoriasis. They offered standing meditation, breathing meditation, hearing meditation, and watching-the-mind-get-stressed-out meditation to psoriasis patients undergoing phototherapy treatments. They also included a visualization about the skin healing in response to the light as part of the meditation in the later stages of treatment. They used two groups of patients, one that meditated and one that did not.
Kabat-Zinn says, "We found that the meditators healed faster than the non-meditators, . . . almost four times as rapidly."
He notes, "The psoriasis study is an example of what is now being call 'integrative medicine,' because it integrates mind-body interventions such as meditations right into the delivery of more conventional medical treatments."
Kabat-Zinn further notes that the study has numerous implications. The mind can positively influence healing in some circumstances, and participatory medicine is a big money-saver for both the patient and the medical system.
One more piece of information to help us with motivation!
For anyone that has not read "Coming to Our Senses", it is an excellent book. It is a little intimidating as it is a rather large book, but it is well worth the effort. Carolyn L.
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