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Maharishi Ayurveda also holds that perfect health is a state present within every person, that can be chosen by the individual, and that the physical body is a portal to a "quantum mechanical body" that exists at the subatomic level where matter and energy are one, and that every organ and process in the body has a quantum equivalent. <ref></ref> Maharishi Ayurveda also holds that perfect health is a state present within every person, that can be chosen by the individual, and that the physical body is a portal to a "quantum mechanical body" that exists at the subatomic level where matter and energy are one, and that every organ and process in the body has a quantum equivalent. <ref></ref>
There is a lack of good quality research in Ayurveda. The general consensus of international experts is consistent with the assessment of the US ] that "most clinical trials of Ayurvedic approaches have been small, had problems with research designs, lacked appropriate control groups, or had other issues that affected how meaningful the results were."<ref></ref> The NCCAM's assessment specifically included a review of studies on the effects of Maharishi Ayur_Veda. <ref> </ref>There is no convincing evidence from available studies that Ayurvedic herbal treatement are effective in the management of pain or neurological disorders. <ref></ref>


===Transcendental Meditation=== ===Transcendental Meditation===

Revision as of 16:52, 18 November 2009

Maharishi Vedic Approach to Health (MVAH) (also known as Maharishi Ayurveda and Maharishi Vedic Medicine) was founded internationally in the mid 1980s by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, founder of the Transcendental Meditation (TM) technique. Maharishi Vedic Approach to Health is considered an alternative medicine and aims at being a complementary system to modern western medicine.

MVAH is based on Ayurveda, a system of traditional medicine from ancient India. It aims to restore balance in the physiology, eliminate toxins and impurities, and awaken the body's natural healing mechanisms, according to Nancy Lonsdorf, Medical Director of The Raj Ayurveda Health Center in Vedic City, Iowa. Entities within the Transcendental Meditation movement, such as Maharishi Ayurveda Products International and various health centers, offer a variety of products and services related to the Maharishi Vedic Approach to Health, including therapies and herbal supplements. There have been controversies over the research, administration, and purity of the products.

Principles

According to Robert Schneider and Jeremy Z. Fields, researchers at the Maharishi University of Management, MVAH is the Maharishi's attempt to revive the ancient Vedic system of health care. The authors explain that Maharishi Vedic Approach to Health uses forty approaches, each one based on one of the forty branches of Vedic literature. According to MVAH, each of these forty branches of Vedic literature has a direct correlation to various aspects of the human physiology. These forty approaches are further reduced to three areas of practical application: mind, body, and environment. In Alternative Medicine and Ethics, Stephen Barrett writes that Ayurveda is traceable to the four Vedas, which attributed most disease and bad luck to demons, devils, and the influences of the stars and planets. It's theory is that the body's function is governed by three physiological principles called doshas: vatta, pitta and kapha, which designate body types and the physical and mental traits they typify. An individual's dosha contains various combinations of vatta, pitta and kapha, which can vary with the seasons and time of day. Disease symptoms are attributed to imbalances in ones dosha, which can be detected through pulse diagnosis or a questionnaire. Balance is achieved through a variety of products and procedures, many of which are specific to ones dosha. The full range of the Maharishi Ayur-Veda program has 20 components"

  • Development of higher consciousness through advanced meditation techniques
  • Primordial sounds
  • Correcting "mistakes of the intellect"
  • Strengthening emotions
  • Vedic structuring of language
  • Music therapy
  • Stimulating the senses
  • Pulse diagnosis
  • Psychophysiological integration
  • Neuromuscular integration
  • Neurorespiratory integration
  • Purification to remove impurities resulting from diet or behavior
  • Dietary measures
  • Herbal dietary supplements
  • Herbal preparations
  • Daily behavioral routines
  • Prediction of future imbalances
  • Religious ceremonies
  • Nourishing the environment
  • Promoting world health and peace

Most of these procedures and product cost hundreds of dollars, and in some cases thousands of dollars, requiring the services of Ayurvedic practitioners. This contrasts with traditional Ayurveda in India, which there is viewed as a medicine of the people, and an inexpensive alternative to allopathic medicine rather than a for-profit endeavor.

Maharishi Ayurveda also holds that perfect health is a state present within every person, that can be chosen by the individual, and that the physical body is a portal to a "quantum mechanical body" that exists at the subatomic level where matter and energy are one, and that every organ and process in the body has a quantum equivalent. There is a lack of good quality research in Ayurveda. The general consensus of international experts is consistent with the assessment of the US National Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine that "most clinical trials of Ayurvedic approaches have been small, had problems with research designs, lacked appropriate control groups, or had other issues that affected how meaningful the results were." The NCCAM's assessment specifically included a review of studies on the effects of Maharishi Ayur_Veda. There is no convincing evidence from available studies that Ayurvedic herbal treatement are effective in the management of pain or neurological disorders.

Transcendental Meditation

Main article: Transcendental Meditation

The Transcendental Meditation technique is the main modality for improving mental health and promoting collective health in MVAH. Studies have suggested a positive correlation between the practice of the Transcendental Meditation technique and various health-related behaviors and physiological parameters including decreased cigarette smoking, decreased alcohol use, decreased anxiety, decreased insomnia, reduction of high cholesterol, improvement in lung function for patients with asthma, and an effect the researchers termed "younger biological age". Reduced illness and medical expenditures and decreased outpatient visits have also been observed in TM practitioners. It may also have an effect on a variety of disorders, including ADHD, pain, diabetes, and congestive heart failure. The National Institutes of Health, the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, and the National Center for Research Resources have funded research on the Transcendental Meditation program. Further research is on-going and researchers have been particularly interested in its potential usefulness in treating heart disease and hypertension, especially among African-Americans, and in promoting longevity. There is no scientific basis for many of the claims made on behalf of Maharishi Ayurveda, other than the benefits of relaxation, and the claims made for the health benefits of Transcendental Meditation have been exaggurated and distorted.

TM and Maharishi Ayur-Veda proponents claim that stress is the basis for all illness, and that TM is the most effective technique for improving all aspects of health. Deepak Chopra, founding president of Maharishi Ayur-Veda Products International, Inc (MAPI), the American Association of Ayurvedic Medicine and former medical director of the Maharishi Ayurveda Health Center for Stress Management and Behavioral Medicine, has stated that "If you have happy thoughts, then you make happy molecules. On the other hand, if you have sad thoughts, and angry thoughts, and hostile thoughts, then you make those molecules which may depress the immune system and make you more susceptible to disease." While TM and other relaxation techniques may temporarily relieve stress, the balance of these claims have no scientific basis.

Body

The "Body Approach" involves reconnecting physiological functioning with the body's inner intelligence by reducing and eliminating impurities and imbalances, which are thought to be the cause of disease.

Pulse diagnosis

The MVAH practitioner uses pulse diagnosis (also known in Sanskrit as "nadi vigyan") to determine the levels of imbalance and impurities in the patient and offer recommendations related to herbal preparations, diet, daily and seasonal routines, exercise, and physiological purification. Procedures that strengthen digestion and proper nutrient absorption are also given importance. Practitioners of MVAH believe that the pulse can be used to help detect imbalances before a disease has manifested. It is thought that herbal remedies, dietary adjustments and changes in routine initiated at this stage can prevent imbalances from developing into disease.

Architecture

MVAH also considers the patient's environment. Maharishi Sthapatya Veda, a system of Vedic architecture, is the main modality for improving the immediate environment.

Maharishi Vedic Astrology

Maharishi Vedic Astrology (also known as Maharishi Jyotish) is said to address planetary influences on individual health. The Maharishi explained that Maharishi Jyotish is an aspect of Maharishi Ayurveda that is premised on the ability to precisely calculate mathematically the unfolding pattern of life, and to locate the trends and tendencies of an individual life within that pattern, making it possible to determine in advance whether a difficult period was coming, and to take action in the present to amend a future difficulty. This was possible, he claimed through the performance by Vedic Pandits in India of "Yagyas", ceremonies designed to restore the balance between the individual and the environment. According Maharishi Jyotish, the solar system has an influence on the human brain, cells and DNA, and Maharishi Yagya performances are Vedic engineering to avert and dissolve negativity, and through which perfection of life and all things are possible.

Products and services

Maharishi Ayurveda Products

Herbal remedies are manufactured and sold by various companies in the Transcendental Meditation movement. Maharishi Ayurveda Products Pvt. Ltd. (MAPPL) is based in New Delhi, India. Maharishi Ayurveda Products International (MAPI) is based in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

Maharishi Ayur-Veda Association of America

Courses to train physicians, nurses and health professionals in the principles and practices of Maharishi Ayurveda are offered by the Maharishi Ayur-Veda Association of America (MAAA) in various locations in the USA. These courses include Continuing Medical Education credit. The faculty and curriculum committee of the MAAA include: Stuart Rothenberg, Robert Schneider, Walter Moelk, Nancy Lonsdorf, Richard Averbach, Gary Kaplan, and Vaidya Manohar Palakurthi.

Spas and health centers

The Transcendental Meditation movement operates dozens of spas and health centers around the world. They offer a series of purification therapies known as Maharishi Panchakarma. One of these purification therapies is "abhyanga", the Sanskrit word for a highly regimented oil massage. Preliminary research suggests that these Maharishi Panchakarma therapies, when used in concert with one another, may be effective in reducing cholesterol, reducing fat soluble toxins and creating an improved sense of well being.

Maharishi Light Therapy with Gems

The Maharishi described Maharishi Light Therapy with Gems (MLG) as a Vedic technology, according to Rainer Picha, Minister of Health for the Global Country of World Peace. Training in the therapeutic use of gemstones is conducted at the Maharishi European Research University in Holland. Picha says that MLG uses "pure cosmic light that enters the physiology, bringing order and helping in every way".

Sound therapies

MVAH also utilizes three kinds of sound therapy:

Recordings of the Vedic Literature recited in Sanskrit are played after the MVAH expert selects a specific branch of the Vedic Literature that corresponds to the appropriate area of the body.

Maharishi Vedic Vibration Technology

Maharishi Vedic Vibration Technology (MVVT) is administered when an MVVT Vedic expert whispers within themselves some specific traditional Vedic sounds that have been chosen to address the health concerns of that individual, and then administers the sound vibrations by blowing on the affected area of the body.

Maharishi Gandharva Veda

Recordings of classical Indian music called Maharishi Gandharva Veda that are purported to integrate and harmonize the cycles and rhythms of the body.

Selected studies

Reduction of carotid atherosclerosis

A study published in 2002 in the American Journal of Cardiology found that a multimodal approach of Maharishi Vedic Medicine can be a treatment for carotid atherosclerosis in older subjects. The randomized controlled trial involving 57 subjects found that subjects in the research group had reduced thickness of the carotid artery after one year of treatment. The treatment consisted of practicing Transcendental Meditation, taking the Maharishi Amrit Kalash herbal formula, practicing Maharishi Yoga asanas and Surya Namaskar, and eating an yurvedic diet.

Treatment of arthritis

A double-blinded randomized controlled trial involving 167 subjects found that the Maharishi Vedic Vibration Technology was effective in reducing pain and stiffness in arthritic subjects. Those in the treatment group also had improved range of motion. One hundred percent relief of symptoms was the most commonly reported category of improvement due to treatment. Overall, the results were highly significant. Analysis of subcategories found significant results for the treatment of peripheral arthritis and rheumatoid arthritis.

Chronic disorders

An uncontrolled study of the Maharishi Vedic Vibration Technology involving 213 subjects found that after three sessions the average self-reportoed improvement in chronic illness was 40.97 percent. The conditions that were treated included neck pain, which improved the most, respiratory ailments, digestive problems, mental health (including anxiety and depression). back pain, headaches, cardiovascular conditions, and eye problems. Findings also showed significant reductions in frequency of discomfort or pain, in intensity of pain, and in the disturbing effects of the pain in daily activitiy.

Controversies

Chalmers and Davis

In October 1991, the Professional Conduct Committee of the British General Medical Council found Roger Chalmers, Dean of Medicine of the unrecognized Maharishi University of Natural Law, Mentmore and Leslie Davis, Dean of Physiology at that institution, guilty of "Serious Professional Misconduct" in connection with their use of Maharishi Ayur-Veda for the treatment of AIDS and HIV, and ordered them erased from the Register. The Committee found, among other things, that there were no proper and approved clinical trials for the treatments, there was inadequate scientific evidence to support the treatments, that they were prescribing and that they had made false and misleading statements on the value of MAV in the treatment of HIV and AIDs and about the TM-affiliated "World Medical Association for Perfect Health". Independent tests of the pills prescribed by Chambers and Davis showed that they had, at best, a negligible effect on the HIV virus, but were 100,000 times more toxic than AZT. Separate warnings were issued on side-effects of both Transcendental Medication and the Maharishi Ayurvedic diet, and by the British Dietetic Association on the potential dangers of the Maharishi Ayurvedic diet to AIDS patients.

Sharma and Chopra

In 1991, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) published an article on the benefits of Maharishi Ayur-Veda titled Letter from New Delhi: Maharishi Ayur-Veda: Modern Insights into Ancient Medicine, authored by Hari Sharma, of the Ohio State University College of Medicine, Brihaspati Dev Triguna, of the All India Ayur-Veda Congress, and Deepak Chopra, of the American Association of Ayurvedic Medicine.

A subsequent article in JAMA alleged that the authors of the first article had not disclosed their financial ties with organizations that sell the products and services about which they wrote. The article also investigated the marketing practices surrounding Ayur-Veda products and services. It was alleged that the media had been intentionally deceived for financial gain. It also challenged the Sharma et al. claim that Maharishi Ayur-Veda was more cost effective than standard medical care. Additionally, the article reported that in the late 1980s, herbal researcher Tony Nader, at the time a Ph.D. candidate in neuroscience at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, had been criticized for misrepresenting his research promoting Maharishi Ayurveda Products International (MAPI) herbal products as being sponsored by MIT and Harvard. The article reported that Nader and David Orme-Johnson were criticized by the organizers of the Annual Meeting of the Society for Economic Botany, which was held at the University of Illinois in Chicago in June 1987. According to the organizers, Nader and Orme-Johnson submitted research abstracts for the conference, but the presentation that they made had little to do with the abstracts, but instead was a promotion for the herbal remedies of MAPI and for Transcendental Meditation. The JAMA article quotes a former TM teacher and chair of the TM center in Washington, D.C., as saying that he had been told to deceive the media.

A letter to the editor by Chopra and Sharma was published in JAMA in October, 1991. Chopra and Sharma wrote that many of the criticisms they had received in letters to the editor were inflammatory and had depended heavily on emotional and unfounded charges, without sound scientific backing and few references. They went on to say that the criticisms were directed largely at the TM organization, rather than to the approaches of Maharishi Ayur-Veda. Andrew Skolnick, in letter to the editor of JAMA, says Chopra and Sharma did not deny and made no apology that they had concealed from JAMA their financial ties to organizations selling and marketing the products and services about which they had written.

Heavy metals

According to a 2008 study published in JAMA, one-fifth of the US-manufactured and Indian-manufactured Ayurvedic medicines purchased via the Internet contained detectable lead, mercury, or arsenic. More than 230 products were included in the study. Two of those products were obtained from Maharishi Ayurveda Products International Inc. USA (MAPI). Ted Wallace, president of MAPI, stated that the company tests its products before and after shipment from India to the US, and that its products are examined for purity, heavy metals, residual pesticides, and biological contaminants.

In 2008, a lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court against Maharishi Vedic Education Development Corporation ("MVED"), Maharishi Ayurveda Foundation and Maharishi Ayurveda Products Ltd. ("MAP Ltd"). The Plaintiff claims that she contracted lead poisoning from Garbhapal Ras, a herbal product that, according to the Iowa Department of Public Health, contained nearly 3% lead. The product was manufactured by MAP Ltd. in India, and prescribed for her by a physician at the Maharishi Ayurveda Arogyadham clinic in Delhi, India. A spokesperson for MVED said that MVED is not involved in the manufacturing, prescribing, or sale of products from the Indian clinic where the product was prescribed and sold. The spokesperson said that products sold in the U.S. are subject to inspection, testing, and quality control.

Notes

  1. Wallace 1993, pp. 64–66
  2. Sharma & Clark 1998
  3. Reddy & Egenes 2002
  4. Sharma & Clark 1998, Preface
  5. ^ Lonsdorf
  6. Schneider & Fields 2006, p. 261
  7. Fields
  8. Schneider & Fields 2006, p. 5
  9. Nader 2000
  10. Schneider & Fields 2006, p. 64
  11. ^ Humber, James M and Almeder, Robert F., Alternative Medicine an Ethics, Vol 13 of Biomedical Ethics Reviews Humana Press, 1998 ISBN 0896034402, 9780896034402 pp 11-13
  12. Weil Andrew, Spontaneous Healing: How to Discover and Embrace Your Body's Ability, Random House, Inc., 2000 ISBN 0804117942, 9780804117944 p. 296
  13. Baer, Hans A., Toward an Integrative Medicine; Merging Alternative Therapies with Biomedicine, Rowman Altamira, 2004 ISBN 075910302X, 9780759103023 pp 124-125
  14. Nanda, Meera, "Ayurveda under the scanner" Frontline Vol 23 No 7, April 8-21, 2008)
  15. Hardy, Mary, et al, "Ayurvedic Interventions for Diabetes Mellitus: A Systematic Review" AHRQ Publication No. 01-E040 September 2001 ISBN: 1-58763-068-0 ISSN: 1530-4396
  16. Weintraub, Michael I. et al, Complimentary and Integrative Medicine in Pain Management',Springer Publishing Company, 2008 ISBN 0826128742, 9780826128744 p264
  17. Sharma & Clark 1998, pp. 147–149
  18. Orme-Johnson & Alexander 1988 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFOrme-JohnsonAlexander1988 (help)
  19. ^ Paul-Labrador 2007 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFPaul-Labrador2007 (help)
  20. ^ Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly 11: 13–87, 1994
  21. Journal of Clinical Psychology 45: 957–974, 1989
  22. Journal of Counseling and Development 64: 212–215, 1985
  23. Journal of Human Stress 5: 24-27, 1979
  24. Wilson, AF., Honsberger, R., Chiu, JT., Novey, HS. "Transcendental meditation and asthma reduction of high blood pressure
  25. International Journal of Neuroscience 16: 53–58, 1982
  26. ^ The American Journal of Managed Care 3: 135–144, 1997
  27. Anonymous 2006 harvnb error: multiple targets (3×): CITEREFAnonymous2006 (help)
  28. Hitti 2006
  29. Jayadevappa 2007 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFJayadevappa2007 (help)
  30. Schneider 2002 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFSchneider2002 (help)
  31. Carroll, Robert Todd, The Skeptic's Dictionary: A Collection of Strange Beliefs, Amusing Deceptions, and Dangerous Delusions, John Wiley and Sons, 2003 ISBN 0471272426, 9780471272427 pp 45-48
  32. Wallace 1993, pp. 76–79
  33. ^ Sharma & Clark 1998, pp. 54–56
  34. http://74.125.95.132/u/maharishi?q=cache:XAVAKZUJspoJ:www.mum.edu/pdf/msvs/v02/glaser.pdf+research+ayurveda&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=us&ie=UTF-8
  35. Wallace 1993, p. 76-89
  36. Schneider & Fields 2006, p. 5
  37. Sharma & Clark 1998, pp. 145–146
  38. Wallace 1993, pp. 107–109
  39. ^ Sharma & Clark 1998, p. 144-145
  40. O'Connell & Alexander 1995, p. 419 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFO'ConnellAlexander1995 (help)
  41. Bonshek, Bonshek & Fergusson 2007, p. 155
  42. MAAA 2009
  43. Wallace 1993, p. 105-107
  44. Sharma & Clark 1998, p. 109
  45. http://74.125.95.104/u/maharishi?q=cache:XAVAKZUJspoJ:www.mum.edu/pdf/msvs/v02/glaser.pdf+panchakarma+research&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=us&ie=UTF-8
  46. Waldschutz 1988
  47. Fagan & Herron 2002
  48. Schneider R H, Cavanaugh K L, Kasture H S, et al. 1990 Health promotion with a traditional system of natural health care: Maharishi Ayur-Veda, Journal of Social Behavior and Personality 5(3):1-27
  49. Sharma H M, Nidich S, Sands D, Smith D E 1993 Improvements in cardiovascular risk factors through Panchakarma purification procedures, Journal of Research and Education in Indian Medicine 12(4):2-13
  50. The Maharishi Ayurveda Treatment of Ten Chronic Diseases — A Pilot Study,Netherlands Magazine of Integrated Science, Vol. 5, No. 35, pp. 586-594, 1989, G.W.H.M. Janssen, MD
  51. Global Good News staff writer 2009
  52. Sharma & Clark 1998, p. 142
  53. ^ Wallace 1993, p. 99-102
  54. Scheider & Fields 2006, pp. 214–216 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFScheiderFields2006 (help)
  55. Sharma & Clark 1998, p. 143
  56. Scheider & Fields 2006, p. 212 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFScheiderFields2006 (help)
  57. Fields JZ, Walton KG, Schneider RH, Nidich S, Pomerantz R, Suchdev P, Castillo-Richmond A, Payne K, Clark ET, Rainforth M., "Effect of a multimodality natural medicine program on carotid atherosclerosis in older subjects: a pilot trial of Maharishi Vedic Medicine," American Journal of Cardiology, 2002;89(8):952-8
  58. Tony A. Nader, D. Edwards Smith, Michael C. Dillbeck, Volker Schanbacher, Susan L. Dillbeck, Phillipe Gallois, Sophie Beall-Rougerie, Robert H. Schneider, Sanford I. Nidich, Gary P. Kaplan, Steele Belok, "A DOUBLE BLIND RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED TRIAL OF MAHARISHI VEDIC VIBRATION TECHNOLOGY IN SUBJECTS WITH ARTHRITIS," Frontiers in Bioscience 6, h7-17, April 1, 2001
  59. Sanford I. Nidich, Robert H. Schneider, Randi J. Nidich, Maxwell Rainforth, John Salerno, David Scharf, D. Edwards Smith, Michael C. Dillbeck and Tony A. Nader, "MAHARISHI VEDIC VIBRATION TECHNOLOGY ON CHRONIC DISORDERS AND ASSOCIATED QUALITY OF LIFE," Frontiers in Bioscience 6, h1-6, April 1, 2001
  60. "Cult doctors investigated over herbal anti-AIDS pills", The Independent (August 19, 1990)
  61. Anonymous 1991
  62. Press Release : The General Medical Council, London, England (October 25, 1991).
  63. ^ Skolnick 1991
  64. Emery 1991
  65. ^ Sharma & Chopra 1991
  66. A 1992 lawsuit brought against the article's author and the editor of JAMA was dismissed in 1993.(Perry 1994)(Anonymous 1996) A Newsweek article published four years later stating that there had been a monetary settlement of the case was later withdrawn as untrue."Correction", Newsweek (November 17, 1997)
  67. Skolnick 1992
  68. ^ Saper 2008 harvnb error: no target: CITEREFSaper2008 (help)
  69. ^ Ellin 2008
  70. The products "Vital Lady" and "Worry Free", manufactured by Maharishi Ayurveda, were found to contain lead.
  71. ^ Szabo 2008
  72. ^ Associated Press 2008

References

External links

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