Meditation and the Immune System

    After my first year in Saybrook’s Mind-Body Medicine Ph.D. program (research track) my mission becomes a little clearer. I am still not quite clear on what my dissertation will be about, but I know it will involve Guided Imagery as an adjunct in an oncological setting.

    The past year was very exciting. I wrapped up several intensive residential requirements, and participated in the Initial Professional Training Program (PTP) and the Advanced Professional Training Program (ATP) at Dr. Gordon’s (who just happens to be the Dean of College of Mind-Body Medicine) Center for Mind Body Medicine. I also had the opportunity to take the Center’s model of Mind Body Skills Groups into the workplace, where it received rave reviews from my participants.

     So, anyway, after a sabbatical from blogging, I am going to narrow my focus to Mind-Body modalities and cancer. There is good research emerging, research I hope I will have the opportunity to conduct myself.

    My first article I present is by Pace et. al (2010) who published a paper titled “Innate immune, neuroendocrine and behavioral responses to psychosocial stress do not predict subsequent compassion meditation practice time." Pace et al. showed that plasma levels of the cytokine IL-6 were significantly reduced by a practice called compassion meditation. This group showed that the Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) was capable of increasing plasma IL-6 in high practice and low practice meditation participants who were challenged with the TSST. In a prior study, the same researchers used a protocol in which meditation occurred before the TSST was administered, raising a very interesting point of prophylactic effect of compassionate meditation on immune system.

    The significance of IL-6 reduction will become apparent in future posts. Right now, it is important to note that stress was significantly reduced via meditation in this study by Emory University School of Medicine researchers.

    Beste Gesundheit,

    Werner

References:

Pace, T. W. W., Negi, L. T., Sivilli, T. I., Issa, M. J., Cole, S. P., Adame, D. D., & Raison, C. L. (2010). Innate immune, neuroendocrine and behavioral responses to psychosocial stress do not predict subsequent compassion meditation practice time. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 35(2), 310-315. doi:10.1016/j.psyneuen.2009.06.008

Comments

[Mitch Proffman]

I found your blog interesting.

I am new to blogging and writing articles, but have been a practicing Chiropractor for a long spell. I am interested in Sleep. I would like to contribute to your blog as a writer and would like to hear back from you. Many patients of mind have issues when it comes to sleep, you probably have a few friends who do as well. There is a lot of good information that I could confer on the subject that could help a lot of people.

Mitch

[Tom]

I am sure that you will have much research about cancer. There are many things you can learn about it. You will also get many resources for your dissertation. Hopefully, you'll succeed your dissertation. Good Luck!

[dr.adams]

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also i would like to stress that there are numerous benefits associated with the practice of meditation miami. just to name one Mediation creates a metabolic state deeper than that which occurs during sleep.

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I am very interested in your paper. Where can I find your article regarding “Innate immune, Neuroendocrine and behavioral responses..."?

[Werner Absenger]

Chiropractor Melbourne, thank you for your interest and comments on the Alternative Medicine Blog. You can follow this link to the original article. It is available through NIH's PubMed at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3083925/