Health News: Top Stories

New study: TM Reduces Health Care Costs by 28%
by Ken Chawkin

Transcendental meditation - USA
www.TM.org/blog Translate This Article
10 October 2011

For the average American family of four, the total cost of health care each year is now a staggering $19,393—more than double what it was nine years ago, according to a recent report by Milliman, a global consulting and actuarial firm. Fortunately, there is an evidenced-based approach that promises to reverse this trend.

According to a new study* published in the September/October 2011 issue of the American Journal of Health Promotion, people with consistently high healthcare costs experienced a 28% cumulative decrease in physician fees after an average five-year period practicing the Transcendental Meditation (TM) technique compared with their baseline. Non-meditating control subjects experienced an increase in fees to physicians over the same time frame.

Click here to read a complete description of the new study.

''This article has major policy significance for saving Medicare and Medicaid [U.S. government-funded health care programs for elderly and low-income people] without cutting benefits or raising taxes,'' said study author Robert E. Herron, Ph.D. ''Almost no intervention for cost containment has decreased medical expenditures by 28% over 5 years from a baseline. Now, it may be possible to rescue Medicare and Medicaid by adding coverage for learning the Transcendental Meditation technique.''

Dr. Norman Rosenthal
''If you had any question about whether to practice TM or not, the new study by Herron provides one more incentive to go ahead and do so,'' said Norman Rosenthal, M.D., clinical professor of psychiatry at Georgetown University Medical School and the author of the New York Times bestseller, Transcendence: Healing and Transformation through Transcendental Meditation. ''The new data show that both you and your wallet will be the better for it.''

References:

* Changes in Physician Costs Among High Cost Transcendental Meditation Practitioners Compared with High Cost Non-practitioners Over 5 Years, American Journal of Health Promotion, 2011; 26(1): 56-60.

Related research on the TM program's effect on healthcare utilization:

∙ An innovative approach to reducing medical care utilization and expenditures. American Journal of Managed Care. 1997 Jan;3(1):135-44.

∙ The impact of the transcendental meditation program on government payments to physicians in Quebec. American Journal of Health Promotion. 1996 Jan-Feb;10(3):208-16.

Related posts:

1. College freshmen at 25-year low in emotional health, study says
2. National Institutes of Health spotlights TM research
3. New study finds TM boosts brain functioning and helps students with ADHD

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