The findings, which appear in the May issue of the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, suggest that the practice of yoga be explored as a possible treatment for depression and anxiety, disorders associated with low GABA levels.
The World Health Organization reports that mental illness makes up to 15% of disease in the world. Depression and anxiety disorders both contribute to this burden and are associated with low GABA levels. Currently, these disorders have been successfully treated with pharmaceutical agents designed to increase GABA levels.
In the present study, magnetic resonance spectroscopic imaging allowed the researchers to compare the GABA levels of 8 subjects prior to and after one hour of , with 11 subjects who did no yoga but instead read for one hour.
