Tai-chi is a traditional form of Chinese martial art which is very much beneficial to health besides guaranteeing solid physical defense. It is considered to be the most traditional form of meditation in China which involves deep breathing along with slow movements of the fluids. According to a latest study, it has been found that this traditional Chinese form of meditation can be the most ideal substitute of general physical therapy in reducing pain among the people who are suffering from the problem of knee osteoarthritis. Apart from causing knee pain, this problem is also responsible for the cause of disability of various types among older adults.
Knee osteoarthritis can happen due to many reasons but when it occurs there is the wearing down of flexible tissues of the knee bone. As there is no such specific cure of this problem, doctors always recommend patients to undertake physical therapy together with certain anti inflammatory medicines to escape from the unbearable knee pain and for improving the mobility. In order to study the usefulness of this traditional Chinese therapy for reducing knee pain among patients due to osteoarthritis, researchers selected such persons of around 200 on a random basis to study its impact over other physical therapies for the duration of 3 months.
The research shows that there has been significant and similar improvement among patients who have undergone tai-chi therapy and other forms of physical therapy. But the greater improvement in terms of mental and physical health has been noticed in the group whose people have undergone with the tai-chi therapy in comparison to other group where the participants have undergone with other forms of therapeutic measures. According to Doctor Chenchen Wang, the study suggests that using this traditional Chinese form of meditation increased number of people in USA can address problems like musculature and other mental and physical health related complications.
Doctor Wang also suggests that as Tai-chi involves active functioning of the body and mind and so it can be used for overall health promotion along with integrating behavioral, spiritual, emotional, psychological and physical elements. In a research study Doctor Wang and his colleagues took classes on tai-chi for the period of twelve weeks on certain group of participants while for the remaining group they took classes on other forms of physical therapies for about thirty minutes for the period of about six weeks. Then both of these groups were asked to practice all these therapies in home for another 6 weeks. This study shows that people undertaking Tai-chi can save expenditure for visiting physical therapy session and can also avoid harmful effects of strong medicinal dose. According to researcher, Jean Michael Brismee the major hallmark of this traditional form Chinese therapy is the regulated movements of body and mind which is useful for the movement of fluid in both outside and inside region of the cartilage region in the joint. But the focus must be based on making people aware of its potential health benefits.
Author Bio: Tony Rollan provides consulting services for Dr. Decuypere Clearwater Chiropractic and writes about alternative medicine, health, nutritions, fitness, and well being.
Image credit: Craig Nagy (Wikipedia)