YOGA doesn’t just make you feel relaxed, it has a measurable effect on your body. It’s so convincing that an Italian doctor plans to prescribe yoga-style breathing to patients with high blood pressure or stress-induced conditions.
Franca Patacchioli at the University of Rome and her colleagues studied a man trained in a yoga-style breathing technique called the Istity Method. After two minutes of step climbing he used either Istity or normal breathing to recover.
The yoga technique brought his heart rate, blood pressure and stress hormone levels down significantly faster (Stress and Health, vol 18, p 195). And the results…
