Yoga is beneficial for cardiovascular health

How Yoga Impacts Health: From an Expert on the Research

If you’ve been trying to eat better, lose weight or live healthier, but find your efforts undone when you’re feeling stressed, maybe it’s time to try another tack.

Yoga is growing in popularity as a way to help reduce the negative impact of stress.  How does it work, and what else might be affected?  In the first part of my video interview with Sat Bir S. Khalsa, PhD, he identified several misconceptions about yoga. In this portion of our chat, Dr. Khalsa, Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, discusses what seem to be some of the physical and biochemical changes yoga brings about that are thought to be involved in the health and behavioral effects of yoga.

If you love science, you’ll find this fascinating.  If you don’t love science, it’s worth thinking about a little anyway.  Especially if you have health problems like high blood pressure, diabetes, insomnia or obesity (or their early “pre-“ stages)… or if you’ve been trying to change some unhealthy eating habits, but feel like you keep running into a wall…yoga might have direct or indirect effects that could make a real difference for you.

Here is part two of my interview with Dr. Khalsa.

Yoga can be performed in a variety of different ways, so the results you get can vary. People differ in how they emphasize and practice the physical postures (asanas), breathing exercises (pranayama), meditation and relaxation techniques, and more.

How does yoga work?

The beneficial health effects Dr. Khalsa notes of how yoga can impact blood pressure, blood sugar control, weight, sleep, anxiety and more may work through several different mechanisms.  Some suggest that each may enhance the benefits of the others.

  • The mind-body link becomes stronger.  This means you become more in touch with when your hunger is satisfied, whether or not an urge to eat is based on physical hunger, and how food and exercise make your body feel. This leads people to make healthier choices naturally, not based on rules or guilt.
  • You become better able to regulate your internal emotional state. Stressful conditions don’t set off the same cortisol and other hormonal and biochemical signals;  you don’t feel as anxious.  Replacing the body environment that develops from the stress-based “flight or fight response”, you see greater evidence of the “relaxation response”.  This could have direct health effects (for example on blood pressure or blood sugar) and make it easier to continue healthy day-to-day eating and activity habits.
  • Your brain changes as you increase use of areas of the brain involved in yoga practice.  This is called brain plasticity, or neuroplasticity.  The portion of the brain involved in learning and managing emotions becomes stronger.  Dr. Khalsa reports that these changes are apparent after eight weeks of regular yoga practice.
  • Deep breathing exercises can directly reduce elevated blood pressure.

Where to go from here?

Yoga is not the only mind-body practice. A variety of meditation forms, often including breathing exercises, may also bring health benefits linked with yoga. Tai chi involves physical movement and some of yoga’s components. Research is underway examining potential health benefits in all these fields.

Intrigued, but uncertain about how or where to give yoga a try? Come back for the next portion of my interview with Dr. Khalsa, for his advice about how to find a yoga class or program and what to expect.

Resources

Even without all the other components of yoga, a few minutes of deep breathing can be a great way to start, end or take a break during the day.  When I try these, I feel more relaxed and de-stressed yet at the same time I come back with renewed energy for what I need and want to do.

Check out these online videos with short breathing exercise breaks:

In less than 3 minutes, Larissa Hall Carlson, of Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health, guides you through Meditation on the Breath.

Or check here to try out a 5-minute yoga break from Kripalu.

References

Yang K. A review of yoga programs for four leading risk factors of chronic diseases. Evid Based Complement Alternat Med. 2007 Dec;4(4):487-91.

Aljasir B, et al.  Yoga Practice for the Management of Type II Diabetes Mellitus in Adults: A systematic review. Evid Based Complement Alternat Med. 2010 December; 7(4): 399–408

Anderson JG, Taylor AG. The metabolic syndrome and mind-body therapies: a systematic review. J Nutr Metab. 2011;2011:276419.

Brewer JA, et al. Meditation experience is associated with differences in default mode network activity and connectivity. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2011 Dec 13;108(50):20254-9.

Tang YY, et al. Short-term meditation training improves attention and self-regulation.  Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2007 Oct 23;104(43):17152-6.

 

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Meet the author/educator

Karen Collins
MS, RDN, CDN, FAND

I Take Nutrition Science From Daunting to Doable.™

As a registered dietitian nutritionist, one of the most frequent complaints I hear from people — including health professionals — is that they are overwhelmed by the volume of sometimes-conflicting nutrition information.

I believe that when you turn nutrition from daunting to doable, you can transform people's lives.

Accurately translating nutrition science takes training, time and practice. Dietitians have the essential training and knowledge, but there’s only so much time in a day. I delight in helping them conquer “nutrition overwhelm” so they can feel capable and confident as they help others thrive.

I'm a speaker, writer, and nutrition consultant ... and I welcome you to share or comment on posts as part of this community!

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