Meditation 'better than morphine' at easing pain

Meditation can be better than morphine at easing pain.

A study has found 80 minutes of meditation training can quickly and effectively quell pain - and do it better than some of the most powerful drugs.

For the study, 15 healthy people who had never meditated before attended four, 20-minute classes to learn a technique called focus attention. The training showed them how to concentrate on their breathing and let go of distracting thoughts and emotions.

They also underwent a series of brain scans, as a heated probe was pressed against their leg, gradually raising the skin temperature to a painful 32C (120F). Meditation greatly reduced the amount of pain they said they were in and its unpleasantness, the Journal of Neuroscience reports.

The scans taken after meditation training showed a calming of brain regions involved in creating the feeling of where and how intense a painful stimulus is. And during meditation, this important pain-processing region appeared to be switched off completely.

The research, from the Wake Forest Baptist Medical Centre in North Carolina, also showed that meditation increased brain activity in areas thought to be key to coping with pain.

Source - Daily Mail