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Research: FIELDS and colleagues,
Listed in Issue 87
Abstract
FIELDS and colleagues, Center for Natural Medicine and Prevention, College of Maharishi Vedic Medicine, Maharishi University of Management, Fairfield, Iowa 52557, USA, investigated the effect of reducing simultaneously several known or suspected risk factors for coronary heart disease (CHD) in healthy elderly people, using a combination treatment approach taken from Maharishi Vedic Medicine (MVM).
Background
CHD is associated with a range of risk factors, many of which have been investigated individually, but few in combination, in clinical studies.
Methodology
In this pilot study, the researchers compared a combination treatment involving modification of diet, exercise, herbal food supplementation and stress reduction, taken from the MVM traditional system of natural medicine, with two control treatments: ‘modern medicine’ (conventional recommendations for diet, exercise and multivitamin supplementation) and ‘usual care’ (no treatment). Subjects were 57 elderly individuals (mean age 74 years). Carotid intima media thickness (IMT), a measure of peripheral atherosclerosis and an indicator of coronary atherosclerosis, was measured by B-mode ultrasound before and 1 year after treatment.
Results
46 of the subjects completed the study. A larger proportion of MVM subjects (16/20) showed decreased IMT compared with the combined findings from the two control groups (12/23; odds ratio [OR] 3.7) (5/9 in the ‘modern medicine’ group and 7/14 in the ‘usual care’ group). Among subjects who had several risk factors for CHD (‘high-risk’ subjects), those in the MVM group showed a greater decrease in IMT (-0.32±0.23 mm, mean±SD) than those in the ‘modern medicine’ (-0.082±0.095) or ‘usual care’ (+0.022±0.085) groups. For all MVM subjects as well as for all high-risk MVM subjects, within-group IMT reductions were statistically significant (-0.15±0.21; all MVM, n=20; high-risk MVM, n=6).
Conclusion
The results of this pilot study indicate that this multi-modality approach, taken from traditional MVM, can reduce atherosclerosis in elderly subjects, particularly in those at high risk of CHD.
References
Fields JZ et al. Effect of a multimodality natural medicine program on carotid atherosclerosis in older subjects: a pilot trial of Maharishi Vedic Medicine. The American Journal of Cardiology 89 (8): 952-8. Apr 2002.
