Role of yoga in health, wellness, and disease.

#international yog day, #asan, #pranayam, #meditation,

“I have saved the lives of 150 people by heart transplants. If I had focused on preventive medicine earlier, I might have saved 150 million”.

• Christian Barnard (south African Cardiothoracic surgeon)

In today’s competitive world and challenging environment, stress is an inevitable and indispensable part of human life. We are all well aware that stress has a deleterious effect on the human mind and body. It gives rise to many issues and problems related to psychological health and lifestyle disorders. The mental health ailments are stress, anxiety, neurosis, panic disorder, sleep disorders, chronic pain, depression, obsessive-compulsive disorders, hormonal imbalance, etc. The lifestyle diseases are hypertension, stroke, diabetes mellitus, obesity, etc. Globally, Because of the above-mentioned disease, there is very high morbidity, mortality, and loss of DALYs.

Yog has proven scientific, spiritual, and medical roles in the management of various diseases and illnesses. Way back in the history of the Ayurvedic system of medicine and in recent years in the period and the era of medical science various Asana, pranayama and meditation were recommended and advised to cure and treat health, medical, mental, and psychological disorders. Yoga provides a holistic and multi-dimensional approach to manage health, well-being and disease in the community. For example, deep breathing exercises (Pranayama) and meditation are advised to hypertensive patients. Kapal bhatti pranayam (favors the release of insulin from pancreatic beta cells) and Dhanur Asan to diabetes Mellitus patients (type -2 diabetes) and Vajrasana to the patient with gastric disorders and digestion problems. Even in the scenario of the SARS- CoV- 2 pandemic, researchers from different universities have explored and highlighted the importance of “certain meditation, yoga, asana, and pranayama in treating and curing Covid 19 infections”.There are various scientific mechanisms and explanations for the wonderful and beneficial effects of yoga on the human mind, body, and soul. Among them these effects are
👉 Increasing in vagal tone (for high BP)
👉Increase in the concentration of oxygen in the blood (during deep breathing exercise)
👉 Decrease in the levels of stress hormone like serum cortisol
👉 Changes in levels of various neurotransmitters during deep meditation (GABA-gamma Amino Butyric acid, dopamine, serotonin, etc).

There are various levels of health promotion and modes of intervention in disease prevention and control. Yog is an adjuvant modality of treatment is a strong tool to halt the progression of disease from primary to tertiary level of disease in conditions like hypertension, diabetes, anxiety, panic disorder, depression and other illness and diseases.
As we know that there four levels of intervention in disease prevention and control. Yoga therapy and yogic interventions are helpful and applicable in all levels of disease control in most of the non-communicable disease and mental health disorders. Following are yogic interventions at different levels
They are,
1.Primordial prevention-It is prevention in the purest sense. It is measures taken prior and before the “appearance of risk factors” in the community. It includes the advocacy of certain Asan, Pranayam, and meditations practices to schools, colleges, universities, sports festivals, workplaces, corporate sectors, armed forces, police personnel, medical professionals, nursing staff, bureaucrats, and public servants to prevent the future outcome of a certain disease.
2.Primary prevention-It measures taken after the appearance of risk factors in the community (like smoking, obesity, etc) and include the application of yoga, pranayama, meditation in day-to-day life.
3.Secondary prevention-It is the early diagnosis and treatment of disease. Various scientific studies have proved the beneficial effect of certain Asan, Pranayam, Kriya, and Meditation in hypertension, Diabetes mellitus (type-2), anxiety, panic disorder,s, and other illness.
4.Tertiary prevention-It is the intervention taken in the late pathogenic phase of the disease. For many terminally ill patients of cancer, meditation has proven beneficial effects on reducing cancer pain and make the patients calm and relaxed.
So it can be concluded, recommended that “YOG” is one of the most cost-effective, cheap, easily available interventions to reduce the overall morbidity and mortality in the community due to various illnesses especially due to Non-communicable and mental disorders at the local, state, country and global level. The advantage of the yoga system is that it can be practiced by anyone irrespective of caste, race, religion, and country differences. At this juncture, one word of caution is that this art of Asan, pranayama, kriya, and meditation must be learnt and understood under the guidance and supervision of well experienced and qualified YOG guru or teacher. So on the occasion of this “International Yoga day” whose theme is “Yoga for well-being” let’s create and spread the awareness about “Yoga” to live a happy and stress-free life.

“The health of the people is the foundation upon which all their happiness and all their power as a state depend”.
-Benjamin Disraeli

Thank you for reading the post and sparing your precious time.🙏🙏🙏🌷
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