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Effect of Qigong on quality of life: a cross-sectional
population-based comparison study in Taiwan.
BMC Public Health. 2011 Jul 9;11:546. by Ho TJ,
Christiani DC, Ma TC, Jang TR, Lieng CH, Yeh YC,
Lin SZ, Lin JG, Lai JS, Lan TY. From School of Public
Health, China Medical University, No, 91, Hsueh-Shih
Road, Taichung 404, Taiwan. tylan@nhri.org.tw.
BACKGROUND: Qigong, similar to Tai Chi
Chuan, is beneficial to health. In Taiwan, Waitankung, a
type of Qigong, is as popular as Tai Chi Chuan. This
population-based comparison study compares the health
-related quality of life between people practicing
Waitankung and their comparable community residents.
METHODS: A total of 165 individuals practicing
Waitankung were matched by age and sex with 660
general individuals for comparison. Information about
health-related quality of life, measured by the SF-36,
and other basic and health conditions was obtained from
the questionnaires. This study used the linear mixedeffect
regression model to examine the association
between health-related quality of life and the practice of
Waitankung. RESULTS: Compared with either
sedentary individuals or individuals practicing other
types of exercise, the Waitankung group scored higher
for eight and five out of ten SF-36 components,
respectively. The Waitankung group scored better in
general health, vitality, and physical component
summary compared to individuals participating in other
types of exercise, even when considering the energy
expended by exercise. CONCLUSION: The results
suggest that Waitankung exercising is significantly
associated with health-related quality of life.
Waitankung may serve as an exercise choice for middle
-aged and older people to improve overall quality of
life.
http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2458/11/546
Meditation training increases brain efficiency in an
attention task. Neuroimage. 2011 Jul 7. by Kozasa
EH, Sato JR, Lacerda SS, Barreiros MA, Radvany J,
Russell TA, Sanches LG, Mello LE, Amaro E Jr. From
Instituto do Cérebro, Instituto Israelita de Ensino e
Pesquisa Albert Einstein, São Paulo, Brazil; Department
of Psychobiology, Universidade Federal De São Paulo,
São Paulo, Brazil.
Abstract: Meditation is a mental training, which
involves attention and the ability to maintain focus on a
particular object. In this study we have applied a
specific attentional task to simply measure the
performance of the participants with different levels of
meditation experience, rather than evaluating meditation
practice per se or task performance during meditation.
Our objective was to evaluate the performance of
regular meditators and non-meditators during an fMRI
adapted Stroop Word-Colour Task (SWCT), which
requires attention and impulse control, using a block
design paradigm. We selected 20 right-handed regular
meditators and 19 non-meditators matched for age,
years of education and gender. Participants had to
choose the colour (red, blue or green) of single words
presented visually in three conditions: congruent,
neutral and incongruent. Non-meditators showed greater
activity than meditators in the right medial frontal,
middle temporal, precentral and postcentral gyri and the
lentiform nucleus during the incongruent conditions. No
regions were more activated in meditators relative to
non-meditators in the same comparison. Non-meditators
showed an increased pattern of brain activation relative
to regular meditators under the same behavioural
performance level. This suggests that meditation
training improves efficiency, possibly via improved
sustained attention and impulse control.
24 Yang-Sheng (Nurturing Life) Volume 1, Issue No. 7