Electroencephalography

Previous research has shown the vast mental and physical health benefits associated with yoga. Yoga practice can be divided into subcategories that include posture-holding exercise (asana), breathing (pranayama, Kriya), and meditation (Sahaj) practice. Studies measuring mental health outcomes have shown decreases in anxiety, and increases in cognitive performance after yoga interventions. Similar studies have also shown cognitive advantages amongst yoga practitioners versus non-practitioners.

In an earlier article entitled "Meditation may predispose to epilepsy: an insight into the alteration in brain environment induced by meditation" published in Medical Hypotheses 2005:64(3):464-7, the author has hypothesized that meditation exerts predisposing influence on epileptogenesis. The hypothesis is based on certain EEG changes and electrographic features (namely hypersynchrony and coherence of EEG activity) and increase in chemical transmitters (namely glutamate and serotonin) in the brain during the course and attainment of meditation.

In an earlier article entitled "Meditation may predispose to epilepsy: an insight into the alteration in brain environment induced by meditation" published in Medical Hypotheses 2005:64(3):464-7, the author has hypothesized that meditation exerts predisposing influence on epileptogenesis. The hypothesis is based on certain EEG changes and electrographic features (namely hypersynchrony and coherence of EEG activity) and increase in chemical transmitters (namely glutamate and serotonin) in the brain during the course and attainment of meditation.

Previous research has shown the vast mental and physical health benefits associated with yoga. Yoga practice can be divided into subcategories that include posture-holding exercise (asana), breathing (pranayama, Kriya), and meditation (Sahaj) practice. Studies measuring mental health outcomes have shown decreases in anxiety, and increases in cognitive performance after yoga interventions. Similar studies have also shown cognitive advantages amongst yoga practitioners versus non-practitioners.

PURPOSE: The aim of this meta-analysis is to evaluate and synthesize the available evidence from the previous 20 years regarding the utility of psychological interventions in the management of psychogenic non-epileptic seizures (PNES). METHOD: Studies were retrieved from MEDLINE via OvidSP and PsychINFO. Selection criteria included controlled and before-after non-controlled studies including case series, using seizure frequency as an outcome measurement. Studies were required to assess one or more types of psychological intervention for the treatment of PNES in adults.

Mindfulness meditation has been purported to be a beneficial practice for wellbeing. It would therefore be expected that the neurophysiology of mindfulness would reflect this impact on wellbeing. However, investigations of the effects of mindfulness have generated mixed reports of increases, decreases, as well as no differences in EEG oscillations in comparison with a resting state and a variety of tasks. We have performed a systematic review of EEG studies of mindfulness meditation in order to determine any common effects and to identify factors which may impact on the effects.

Patients with severe traumatic brain injury resulting in increased intracranial pressure refractory to first-tier interventions challenge the critical care team. After exhausting these initial interventions, critical care practitioners may utilize barbiturate-induced coma in an attempt to reduce the intracranial pressure. Titrating appropriate levels of barbiturate is imperative. Underdosing the drug may fail to control the intracranial pressure, whereas overdosing may lead to untoward effects such as hypotension and cardiac compromise.

Assessment of hypnotic susceptibility is usually obtained through the application of psychological instruments. A satisfying classification obtained through quantitative measures is still missing, although it would be very useful for both diagnostic and clinical purposes. Aiming at investigating the relationship between the cortical brain activity and the hypnotic susceptibility level, we propose the combined use of two methodologies - Recurrence Quantification Analysis and Detrended Fluctuation Analysis - both inherited from nonlinear dynamics.

In the last decade, functional brain imaging techniques ranging from fMRI to PET to EEG have added to understanding the mechanisms involved in cognitive, affective, and motoric processes. More recently, as demonstrated by papers in a variety of neuroscience journals, the hypnotic experience and its modulation of critical human processes such as pain have added hypnotic procedures to the experimental techniques available for the neuroscience community.

BACKGROUND: Several recent reviews have reached guardedly positive conclusions about the effectivenessof biofield therapies in healthcare.(1,2) These studies mainly involved randomized controlled trials to determine changes in condition-related outcome measures, but few addressed the biological basis of these effects. STUDY OBJECTIVE AND RATIONALE: We performed a systematic review of studies designed to examine whether biofield therapists undergo physiological changes as they enter the healing state.