Researchers from the Swami Vivekananda Yoga Research Foundation in Bangalore, India studied the effect of integrated yoga practice and guided relaxation on both perceived stress and measured autonomic response in healthy pregnant women.

The 122 healthy women in the study were recruited between the 18th and 20th week of pregnancy at prenatal clinics in Bangalore, India, and were randomized to practicing yoga and deep relaxation or standard prenatal exercises 1-hour daily. Forty-five participants in each group completed the study, and were evaluated by repeated measures analysis of variance.

Researchers from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam in The Netherlands explored whether self-help could offer an inexpensive and more accessible alternative to face-to-face treatment, comparing non-pharmacological therapies only.

Ten studies with a total of 1000 subjects were included. The self-help style of intervention was found to improve sleep efficiency (d=0.42; p<0.05), sleep onset latency (d=0.29; p<0.05), waking after sleep onset (d=0.44; p<0.05) and sleep quality (d=0.33; p<0.05) but not total sleep time (d=0.02; p>0.05).

Researchers R. Bruce Lydiard, Ph.D., M.D., and Mark Hammer MD from the Ralph H. Johnson VA Medical Center in Charleston SC , are embarking on some important research that targets sleep disturbance in posttraumatic stress.  Their premise is that the first-line treatments for posttraumatic stress disorder - medication (selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors) and cognitive behavior therapy – do not adequately treat nightmares and insomnia. Nor do they feel that there is sufficient awareness in the mental health community of the critical role sleep disturbance plays in PTSD.

Researchers from the Department of Plastic Surgery of University Medical Center Groningen, in The Netherlands, sought to see whether practicing motor imagery during the immobilization period after flexor tendon injury results in a faster recovery of hand function.

The randomized controlled trial included 28 patients, post-surgery for flexor tendon repair, who were randomly assigned to either an intervention group or a control group.

Researchers at the Laboratory of Neuro Imaging at UCLA School of Medicine, Los Angeles, CA, looked at the possible links in the brain that could cause the connection between meditation practice and psychological, physiological and cognitive well-being.

Using high-resolution MRI data of 44 subjects, they set out to examine the underlying anatomical correlates of long-term meditation.  (For those with a technical interest, they used voxel-based morphometry in association with a recently validated automated parcellation approach.)

Researchers from Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, The Netherlands, examined whether a self-help intervention might offer an inexpensive and more accessible alternative to face-to-face therapy for the non-pharmacologic treatment of insomnia. 

They conducted a meta-analysis of randomized controlled studies examining the effects of self-help interventions for insomnia, identified through extensive searches of bibliographical databases.  They examined the effects of self-help on different sleep outcomes, in comparison with both wait list controls and face-to-face treatments.

Researchers from the Unidad de Investigació Médica in Merida, Mexico, explored the efficacy of Ericksonian Hypnosis for managing the symptoms of fibromyalgia.
 
Forty-three female fibromyalgia patients were randomly assigned to receive either six months of Ericksonian hypnosis (n = 20) or a sham-hypnosis protocol (n = 23).  Each month, measures were taken using the Patient and Physician Global Disease Assessment, a count of tender points,  and the Fibromyalgia Impact Questionnaire (FIQ).

Researchers from the Technische Universität München in Munich, Germany investigated the efficacy of a brief relaxation technique consisting of functional relaxation (FR) and guided imagery (GI) in adult asthmatics in a randomized controlled trial.

Sixty-four patients with extrinsic bronchial asthma (externally caused, usually from inhaled allergens) were treated over a 4-week period and assessed at baseline, after treatment, and after 4 months, for follow-up.

Sixteen patients completed the functional relaxation, fourteen the guided imagery, and fifteen a combination of both.  Thirteen received a placebo relaxation technique as the control intervention (CI). Primary outcome measures were forced expiratory volume in the first second [FEV(1)] as well as specific airway resistance [sR(aw)].

Researchers from Nantong First People's Hospital, Jiangsu, China, explored the effectiveness of electroencephalographic (EEG) biofeedback therapy for ADHD in children, by assessing the changes of the ratio of brain theta to beta waves (when the children fulfill cognition tasks, brain theta wave activity increases and beta wave activity weakens), and by using the  IVA-CPT (integrated visual and auditory continuous performance test) as an assessment measure.

Researchers from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada reviewed the literature to investigate whether Eastern techniques, such as mindfulness, acupuncture or yoga might be used to improve unsatisfying sexual experiences in women (problems with desire, arousal or orgasm).

The search revealed only two empirical studies of mindfulness, two of acupuncture, and one of yoga in the treatment of sexual dysfunction.  These limited results revealed that mindfulness significantly improved several aspects of sexual response and reduced sexual distress in women with sexual desire and arousal disorders.