The Healthy Mind and Body Connection
Mind-body medicine originated more than 4,000 years ago, when physicians in China noticed that illness often followed periods of frustration in their patients' lives. Today in western societies like the U. S., medical professionals also share the view that emotions, life events, and coping skills can have a very strong influence on health.
Healthy mind-body medicine is now part of exciting new fields such as psycho neuroimmunology and behavorial cardiology.
Psycho neuroimmunology focuses on the relationship of our thoughts and emotions to our brain chemistry and immune system.
Behavioral cardiology is the application of psychological and social factors in the assessment and reduction of cardiovascular risk. It is an important field for a number of reasons, including reducing recurring heart attacks, helping patients recover sooner, and improving family support.
""By changing our minds, we really can change our lives,"
Dr. Arvon.
It is the long-term consequences of an anxiety-filled existence that are particularly troubling. Over time, chronic emotional and psychological stress can:
Promote fat storage
Retain salt in the body
Destroy the body's resistance to cancer, infections, and illness
Cause infertility and sexual dysfunction
Exacerbate diabetes
Deposit cholesterol in blood vessels
Accelerate heart rate and increase blood pressure, and thicken blood so it clots more readily, which makes you more prone to suffering a heart attack or stroke.
Chronic stress can
make us fat - and sick