Laughter – really is the best medicine!
a study into the effect of laughter and depression

A daily dose of laughter may be good for the you because just like exercise, it makes the blood vessels work more efficiently, American researchers reported recently. Stress and depression, on the other hand, can raise the risk of dying from heart failure, another study found.

Presented at a meeting of the American College of Cardiology in Orlando, Florida, the two studies showed how psychological factors could affect a person's health.

”We don’t recommend that you laugh and not exercise, but we do recommend that you try to laugh on regular basis. Thirty minutes of exercise three times a week, and 15 minutes of laughter on a daily basis is probably good for the vascular system,” said Dr Michael Miller of the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore.

In the experiment, researchers showed two movies, one humorous and the other stressful to 20 healthy volunteers and monitor the blood vessels’ reaction. The researchers specifically looked at the endothelium, the linking of the vessels, and found that the blood flow was reduced 35% in 14 of the 20 volunteers after watching the stressful movie clips. However in 19 of the 20 volunteers who laughed at the funny movie segments, blood flowed 22% more freely.

“The endothelium is the first line in the development of the atherosclerosis or hardening of the arteries, so, given the result of our study, it is conceivable that laughing may be important to maintain a healthy endothelium, and reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease”. Miller said.

“The magnitude of change we saw in the endothelium is similar to the benefit we might see with aerobic activity, but without the aches, pains and muscle tension associated with exercise”.

Anatomy of an Illness
In his famous book, Anatomy of an Illness, Norman Cousins described his fight against a disease for which doctors had no known cure or treatment. He was told that he has little chance, if any of surviving. Hearing this, Cousins decided to took matter into his own hand and started to plan his own recovery plan, including laughter and affirmative emotion like love, faith and hope. He also took a great deal of vitamin C, which he read would be beneficial for his condition.

He said, “I made the joyous discovery that ten minutes of genuine belly laughter had an anesthetic effect and would give me at least two hours of pain-free sleep. When the pain-killing effect of the laughter wore off, we would switch on the motion picture projector again and not infrequently, it would lead to another pain-free interval.” He watched marx brothers films.

Cousins also believed his body chemistry was enhanced up to the stage that inflammation from his disease actually decreased markedly several hours after each laughing episode. Despite his doctor’s grim pronouncements that he would never survive, he turned his back on heavy medication and went to cure himself of his disease. An achievement that surprised all his doctors and the medical community.

His famous line is, “Drugs are not always necessary. Belief in recovery always is”

Depression the best poison?
If laughter helps increase blood flow and in Norman Cousin’s case heal him from his disease, negative emotion like stress or depression could lead to death, especially for people who currently suffer from illness.

In a study done by Dr. Wei Jiang and colleagues from Duke University in North Carolina, it was found that heart failure patients who have mild depression had 44% greater risk of dying. The study was done on 1,005 volunteers.

“This adverse association of depression and increased long-term mortality was independent of other factors, including age, marriage, cardiac function and the root cause of the heart failure,” Jiang said.

“Approximately half of all patients with heart failure will die within five years of diagnosis, and we believe that our study appears to identify a group of these patients who are at a higher risk for dying.”

Jiang said it is not clear why, but he said patients with depression tend not to exercise or take medications properly.
“Also, depressed patients tend to make unhealthy lifestyle choices in such areas a diet and smoking,” she said.

	The Power of Your Emotion Positive attitudes and ability to handle emotions have been shown to strengthen our ability to fight disease.					Faith and Healing Medical community are slowly embracing the fact that faith can do wonders.
•	Laughter -really is the best medicine! Laughing may be important to maintain a healthy endothelium, and reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease				•	What does faith has to do with healing Religious faith not only promotes overall good health, but also aids in the recovery from serious illness
•	Love and healing In Yale University, a study of 194 heart attacks patients found that patients who claimed to have emotional support were 3 times more likely to be alive 6 months after the attack than the one without it.				•	Proofs that faith can heal In a 1997 study in India, Hindus who prayed regularly were 70% less likely to have coronary heart disease.

"a quote"

When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us

- helen keller