Meditation and Psychiatric Disorders

Emerging evidence shows that in addition to stress, anxiety and depression, meditation is effective in treating in a host of other psychiatric disorders, and in maintaining sound mental health in general. Meditation is gradually being incorporated by more and more psychiatrists in the treatment plan for obsessive compulsive disorder, bipolar disorder, attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder, bulimia nervosa, alienation, sexual arousal disorder, schizophrenia, among others. A 2005 study by researchers Elkins and others showed that at least 30% of psychiatric inpatients used various mind body techniques including relaxation, visualization and meditation.

Bipolar disorder is defined by the presence of one or more episodes of abnormally elevated mood, clinically referred to as ‘mania’. In 2007, researcher Williams and others of Oxford University showed in a study that meditation helps to reduce symptoms of bipolar disorder in individuals.

Bulimia Nervosa is an eating disorder primarily affecting women in which patients throw up after eating. 40% of women with bulimia (eating disorder) do not improve with normal treatment.

In a 2008 study, researcher Proulx found that meditation brings about an inner transformation in Bulimia patients and suggested that meditation may be effective in treating the aforementioned 40% and might also be useful in preventing symptoms in younger women.In a 2008 study, Brotto and others found that meditation brought about significant improvements in women suffering from sexual arousal disorder, and was particularly effective in treating those who have suffered sexual abuse.

In a 1999 study, researchers Shannahoff-Khalsa and others of the University of California at San Diego found that Kundolini meditation was effective in treating patients with obsessive compulsive disorder.

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