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title: 禪定能治心臟病嗎？Can Meditation Curb Heart Attacks？
description: "研究報道：禪定能治心臟病嗎？Can Meditation Curb Heart Attacks？"
---

研究報道：禪定能治心臟病嗎？
Can Meditation Curb Heart Attacks？

智悲翻譯中心
譯者、校對：圓唐

理查德·帕特森為《紐約時報》撰稿說，最近的研究表明超然禪定可能有益于心臟健康。

當朱莉婭·邦克斯接近70歲時，她開始練習超然禪定。她有動脈栓塞、高血壓等疾病並且身體中部極其超重，因此，她參加了測試禪定益處的臨床試驗。

現在，邦克斯夫人，79歲，住在威斯康星州的密爾沃基，每天打坐2次，每次20分鍾，空出她稱作「一點為自己的時間。」

「你從來沒有覺得你有空余時間，但你把時間給自己，你就會得到你需要的放松。」邦克斯夫人說。六年前冠狀動脈搭橋術後，她從嚴重的心臟病發作和一個冗長的住院期中幸存下來。

「你有東西在你的心里，但你要把它吸出來並且做冥想，然後你會發現自己是更悠然地生活」她說。「你會發現你想的、你有的問題根本不存在——它們僅僅是你專注的事情。」

精神放松對生理真的有好處嗎？對于邦克斯夫人來說，研究表明，它是有好處的。儘管她還采用藥物治療，但是她的血壓已經達到了控制，並且她已經減少了75英磅體重。

這個研究結果發表在本星期于佛羅里達的奧蘭多召開的美國心臟病協會會議上。他們提出對像邦克斯夫人一樣有確定的冠狀動脈疾病的高風險人群，超然禪定有真正的治療價值。

研究人員說，跟蹤大約200名病患平均五年時間後，與未進行禪修的類似患者相比，進行禪修的高風險患者的心臟病發作、中風和死亡的危險性降低了接近一半。對未進行禪修的患者進行的健康飲食和生活方式教育更接近于常規方式。

在大約100名禪修的病人中，20例心臟病發作、中風和死亡；而對照組中有32個。禪修者保持無疾病狀態的傾向更長些，也平均降低了他們的收縮壓5毫米汞柱。

「我們發現降低血壓是顯著的——這可能是一個重要的導致疾病好轉的原因」羅伯特·施奈德醫生說，他是天然藥物和預防研究所的所長，該研究所依托于美國愛荷華州美田醫院馬哈里斯管理大學，他們發表了這些研究結果。這項研究是威斯康辛州的密爾瓦基醫學院與該研究所合作實施的結果。

一項早期的針對高危的密爾沃基居民的研究中，也發現伴隨著常規藥物治療的超然禪定，能幫助降低血壓。研究中的這些居民中許多人超重或肥胖，大多數人只有高中學歷或更低的學歷，大約40%的人吸菸，一半的人收入低于一年1萬美元。

施耐德醫生說參與者發現超然靜坐易于學習和實踐。

「幸運的是，它不需要任何特殊的教育，並且與生活方式的哲學或信仰不發生沖突；它是一個直截了當的技術，可以使心靈和身體得到越來越深的休息」他說。此外他還相信這個技術可以「幫助重置自己體內的自我修復功能及恢復平衡機制。」

施耐德醫生說禪修的其他好處是可以減少緊張壓力，因為這會導致大腦的改變，以減少類皮質醇的緊張荷爾蒙，並且抑制與動脈粥樣硬化相關的炎症過程。

「是什麼樣的刺激因素導致了心血管疾病？」西奧多·寇晨醫生說，他是威斯康辛醫學院的臨床研究副院長。「激素、神經激素、皮質醇、兒茶酚胺——都傾向于增加緊張壓力。它們能在某種程度上導致心血管疾病嗎？禪定時這些激素的降低可以導致疾病的減少嗎？我們只能推測。」

另外一項關于超然禪定的近期研究成果發表在《美國高血壓雜志》上，該研究關注的是健康的年輕人。報告發現，通過超然禪定可以改善大學生的心理壓力和他們的情緒，而對那些有高血壓風險的人可以降低其血壓。施耐德醫生也參與該項研究，該研究在華盛頓的美國大學進行，包括298名學生，他們被隨機分配到禪定組或在後續名單中。

有高血壓危險並禪修的學生們收縮壓降低了6.3毫米汞柱，而舒張壓平均降低了4毫米汞柱。

Can Meditation Curb Heart Attacks?

When Julia Banks was almost 70, she took up transcendental meditation. She had clogged arteries, high blood pressure and too much weight around the middle, and she enrolled in a clinical trial testing the benefits of meditation.

Now Mrs. Banks, 79, of Milwaukee, meditates twice a day, every day, for 20 minutes each time, setting aside what she calls 「a little time for myself.」

「You never think you』ve got that time to spare, but you take that time for yourself and you get the relaxation you need,」 said Mrs. Banks, who survived a major heart attack and a lengthy hospitalization after coronary artery bypass surgery six years ago.

「You have things on your mind, but you just blot it out and do the meditation, and you find yourself being more graceful in your own life,」 she said. 「You find out problems you thought you had don』t exist — they were just things you focused on.」

Could the mental relaxation have real physiological benefits? For Mrs. Banks, the study suggests, it may have. She has gotten her blood pressure under control, though she still takes medication for it, and has lost about 75 pounds.
Findings from the study were presented this week at an American Heart Association meeting in Orlando, Fla. They suggest that transcendental meditation may have real therapeutic value for high-risk people, like Mrs. Banks, with established coronary artery disease.

After following about 200 patients for an average of five years, researchers said, the high-risk patients who meditated cut their risk of heart attacks, strokes and deaths from all causes roughly in half compared with a group of similar patients who were given more conventional education about healthy diet and lifestyle.

Among the roughly 100 patients who meditated, there were 20 heart attacks, strokes and deaths; in the comparison group, there were 32. The meditators tended to remain disease-free longer and also reduced their systolic blood pressure by five millimeters of mercury, on average.

「We found reduced blood pressure that was significant – that was probably one important mediator,」 said Dr. Robert Schneider, director of the Institute for Natural Medicine and Prevention, a research institute based at the Maharishi University of Management in Fairfield, Iowa, who presented the findings. The study was conducted at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, in collaboration with the institute.

An earlier study of high-risk Milwaukee residents, many of them overweight or obese, also found transcendental meditation, along with conventional medications, could help reduce blood pressure. Most of those in the study had only high-school educations or less, about 40 percent smoked and roughly half had incomes of less than $10,000 a year.

The participants found transcendental meditation easy to learn and practice, Dr. Schneider said.

「Fortunately, it does not require any particular education and doesn』t conflict with lifestyle philosophy or beliefs; it』s a straightforward technique for getting deep rest to the mind and body,」 he said, adding that he believes the technique 「helps to reset the body』s own self-repair and homeostatic mechanism.」

Dr. Schneider said other benefits of meditation might follow from stress reduction, which could cause changes in the brain that cut stress hormones like cortisol and dampen the inflammatory processes associated with atherosclerosis.

「What is it about stress that causes cardiovascular disease?」 said Dr. Theodore Kotchen, associate dean for clinical research at the Medical College of Wisconsin. 「Hormones, neural hormones, cortisol, catecholamines — all tend to be elevated in stress. Could they in some way be contributing to cardiovascular disease? Could a reduction in these hormones with meditation be contributing to reduction in disease? We can only speculate.」

Another recent study focusing on transcendental meditation, published in The American Journal of Hypertension, focused on a young healthy population. It found that stressed-out college students improved their mood through T.M., and those at risk for hypertension were able to reduce their blood pressure. Dr. Schneider was also involved in that study, which was carried out at American University in Washington and included 298 students randomly assigned to either a meditation group or a waiting list.

Students who were at risk of hypertension and practiced meditation reduced systolic blood pressure by 6.3 millimeters of mercury and their diastolic pressure by 4 millimeters of mercury on average.