A meditation technique promoted by the controversial Maharishi
organization of Iowa claims significant decreases the severity of congestive heart failure in a small pilot study published in Ethnicity&Disease (Winter 2007).

The authors from the University of Pennsylvania evaluated 23 African American men and women, average age 64, who were recently hospitalized with New York Heart Association class II or III congestive heart failure. Participants were randomized to either the Transcendental Meditation (TM) technique or health education—in addition to usual medical care.

They measured changes in heart function with a six-minute walk test, and measures for quality of life, depression, and rehospitalizations. Changes in outcomes from baseline to three and six months after treatment were analyzed.

According to lead author Ravishankar Jayadevappa, Ph.D., of the University of Pennsylvania, the TM group significantly improved on the six-minute walk test after both three and six months of TM practice compared to the control group. The TM group also showed improvements in quality of life measurements, depression, and had fewer rehospitalizations.

Congestive heart failure accounts for more than 2.5 million hospital admissions per year in the U.S. Nearly 500,000 new patients are diagnosed with congestive heart failure every year—and 300,000 patients die each year from this disease, and Maharishi certifies instructors in Transcendental Meditation as an alternative to medicine. 

African Americans have twice the mortality rates from congestive heart failure as white Americans and Maharishi exploits that, claiming their Transcendental Meditation improves heart functioning by reducing sympathetic nervous system activation associated with stress that is known to contribute to the failing heart, according to the authors.

"The results indicate that TM can be effective in improving the functional capacity, and quality of life, of congestive heart failure patients. These results also suggest long-term improvements in survival in these individuals," Jayadevappa, a health economist, said.

They say urther validation of the outcomes is planned via a large multicenter trial with long-term follow-up.

"This present finding is consistent with previous research demonstrating that the Transcendental Meditation program reduces factors that contribute to the cause or progression of heart failure, such as high blood pressure, stress, metabolic syndrome, left ventricular hypertrophy (enlargement of the heart) and severity of atherosclerosis (hardening of the arteries)," said Robert Schneider, M.D., F.A.C.C., co-author of the study and director of the Institute for Natural Medicine and Prevention at Maharishi University of Management in Fairfield, Iowa.