Sahaja Yoga meditation as a treatment for hot flushes

Sahaja Yoga meditation (SYM) may be helpful in mitigating the experience of hot flushes (HFs) in menopause via a number of possible pathways. First, like many other forms of meditation, SYM has been shown to reduce arousal in laboratory experiments. An interesting study on stress-induced HFs however, suggests that simple reduction of arousal may not be the only explanation. Swartzmann (1990) used objective measuring strategies and found that menopausal women exposed to various experimental stressors, experienced not only greater sensitivity to pre-existing symptoms, but also more episodes. Unexpectedly however, the additional HFs neither occurred in acute association with the stressor nor were they directly associated with elevated sympathetic arousal. Rather, the data suggested that the effects were mediated by a mechanism that is considerably slower than the sympathetic adreno-medullary system. This implies that a neuro-endocrine pathway may be involved in reducing central sympathetic activation. SYM may exert its effect by disrupting that part of the HF mechanism which is associated with increased central sympathetic activation.

Dr Ramesh Manocha

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