YOGA AND ITS BENEFITS: A PATH OF SEARCH AND MEETING

This article aims to bring a snippet of the historical path of Yoga, identifying its benefits, knowing a little of its practices and conduct to be performed. The word Yoga comes from the Sanskrit root yuj, whose meaning refers to the yoke, joining, union, communion, integration. We can define the Yoga as a set of values, attitudes, precepts and spiritual techniques from India, responsible for founding the ancient civilization of India. The practice of Yoga is based on a need to deepen the spiritual dimension as a way of being able to connect more authentically with yourself and the world. We can understand spirituality through any experience that can produce profound change within each person and can lead to an integration not only personal, but also an integration with the world. Therefore, the Yoga proposes to work, promoting in being a physical, mental, and spiritual recovery of the subject. The practice of Yoga, in the face of meditation exercise, can contribute to the decrease of cortisol and adrenaline levels, improving the activation of the parasympathetic nervous system, reducing anxiety and stress, consequently acting in an improvement of sleep and pain. The secularization process brought effective changes to the religious field, especially with regard to the “new” religions. In this context, new spiritualities were emerging and gaining space and strength. This contributed to the reach of Yoga to be more and more widespread, learned and incorporated into one of the alternative practices that can bring health benefits.

682 How doctors sleep during the COVID-19 pandemic: A survey

Introduction Sleep deprivation is known amongst doctors (working hours of doctors in developing countries are long and not tightly regulated) and the COVID-19 pandemic may make it worse. We conducted this survey to assess the quantitative and qualitative effects of this pandemic on the sleep of doctors. Methods A survey was created on Google Forms and it was circulated / sent through WhatsApp for voluntary participation amongst several groups of doctors and individually as well. Results We received 304 responses from doctors of various specialties, cadres and background. Our results showed that 52% of them were involved in direct clinical care of COVID-19 patients. 55.8% doctors reported changes in sleep pattern and 37.2% reported reduced duration of sleep, as compared to the time before the pandemic. More than 50% of them slept for less than 7 hours a night since the beginning of the pandemic. 37% had difficulty falling asleep and maintaining sleep. 30% had difficulty in concentration and functioning during day-time. Non-refreshing sleep was experienced by 36.3% of them and 18.8% of physicians had recollected having COVID-19 related dreams. 33% doctors’ last thought before sleep and first thought after waking up were about COVID-19. 36% doctors looked for information about COVID-19 on media immediately before going to sleep and immediately after waking up. More than 60% doctors started meditation, exercise, yoga or relaxation techniques for getting better sleep. Conclusion A further decline in duration and quality of sleep due to the COVID-19 pandemic amongst already sleep-deprived doctors may be detrimental not only to their own health but for patient-care also. Support (if any):

Evaluating mindfulness training for medical and PhD nursing students

Background: it is recognised that mindfulness training can positively impact holistic wellbeing and can improve mood, focus and resilience. Health service students often experience high levels of psychological morbidity. Engaging in mindfulness techniques may positively impact the psychological wellbeing of healthcare students. This is of vital importance to ensure optimum learning for healthcare practice with its associated challenges. Method: an evaluation was conducted with medical students (n=4) and PhD nursing students (n=6), who took part in a mindfulness-based workshop, followed by five weekly 30-minute sessions of mindfulness training, including a 15-minute meditation exercise. Data collection was carried out at baseline and post intervention, followed by a focus group discussion to elucidate qualitative experiences. Results: significant findings were identified with respect to cognitive mindfulness scores (P=0.02) and resilience (P=0.04). Discussion: data reflected three themes: the impact of mindfulness and maintaining practice, improvements in wellbeing, and improvements in academic endeavour. Conclusions: this evaluation found significant improvements in the ability to cope with stress and increased attention and resilience in all students. Although results are not generalisable in this small evaluation, students reported increased concentration levels and improved focus, both of which are likely to impact positively on any psychological symptoms, particularly those related to workload pressures.

Incorporating a Mindfulness Meditation Exercise Into a Stuttering Treatment Program

A mindfulness meditation exercise was incorporated into a stuttering treatment program for an adult male who stutters. Speech disfluencies were analyzed before and after mindfulness meditation and implementation of fluency shaping techniques. Findings suggested that including a mindfulness meditation exercise into a treatment program may be helpful for people who stutter.

Mindful Emotion Awareness

Chapter 7 of Unified Protocol for Transdiagnostic Treatment of Emotional Disorders: Workbook presents the benefits of applying mindful awareness, a nonjudgmental present-focused stance, to emotional experiences. Mindful awareness is first practiced through a formal meditation exercise that introduces readers to applying this quality of attention to their emotions. Next, readers are encouraged to continue practicing mindful emotion awareness though the use of a Mindful Mood Induction exercise. Finally, the chapter continues by focusing on the Anchoring in the Present skill, which allows us to apply the concept of mindful emotion awareness to emotional experiences as they are coming up in daily life.

The bright side of negative experience: Preexposure to negative image improves non-judging attitude in mindfulness meditation

Mindfulness is a state of attending to current experiences without judging them and can be achieved by a meditation exercise called mindfulness meditation. A previous study revealed that non-judging of inner experiences, which is a facet of mindfulness, is related to the suppression of negative emotion. For a deeper understanding of this process, the present study examined whether the exposure to negative stimuli modulates the effect of mindfulness meditation. In the experiment, 24 participants were randomly assigned to one of two emotional conditions (negative and neutral). They observed a sequence of negative or neutral images and then engaged in mindfulness meditation. They also answered the Five Facet Mindfulness Questionnaire before and after the meditation. The results showed that the score on the non-judging subscale increased in the participants who were exposed to the negative images. The improvement in the non-judging attitude was possibly due to the psychological function that helps to suppress negative emotion that was evoked by the previous event.

The Effect of Three Different Meditation Exercises on Hypertension: A Network Meta-Analysis

We aimed to use the pairwise and network meta-analysis to estimate the effects of different meditation exercises on the control of systolic blood pressure (SBP) and diastolic blood pressure (DBP). Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) were retrieved from PubMed and Embase up to June 2016, which are published in English and reported on meditation exercise for hypertensive patients. Risks of bias assessment of the included studies were assessed by Cochrane Collaboration Recommendations and network meta-analysis was performed by ADDIS. Mean difference (MD) and its 95% confidence interval (CI) were used as the effect size. A number of 19 RCTs were included in this study. Results of pairwise comparisons indicated that meditation exercise could significantly decrease the SBP and DBP, compared with other interventions (MD = −7.10, 95% CI: −10.82 to −3.39; MD = −4.02, 95% CI: −6.12 to −1.92). With good consistence and convergence, network meta-analysis showed that there were no significant differences between meditation and other interventions on SBP. For DBP, Qigong was significantly lower than “no intervention” (MD = −11.73, 95% CI: −19.85 to −3.69). Qigong may be the optimal exercise way in lowering SBP and DBP of hypertensive patients, but a detailed long-term clinical research should be needed in the future.

Evidence That a Brief Meditation Exercise Can Reduce Prejudice Toward Homeless People

Recent research has shown that integrating social and clinical psychological perspectives can be effective when designing prejudice-interventions, with psychotherapeutic techniques successful at tackling anxiety in intergroup contexts. This research tests whether a single, brief loving-kindness meditation intervention, without containing any reference to the intergroup context, could reduce prejudice. This exercise was selected for its proven positive effects on mental and physical health. We observed that participants who took part in two variations of this meditation exercise (one involving a stranger, the other a homeless person) reported reduced intergroup anxiety, as well as more positive explicit attitudes, and enhanced future contact intentions. We conclude that combining approaches in intergroup relations and psychotherapy could be beneficial to design new interventions to combat prejudice and discrimination.