Abstract

Background: Life, nowadays, is full of stress, and stress become almost an integral part of our daily routine life. It affects the every aspect of our life and leads to development of stress-related disorders such as hypertension, diabetes mellitus, and many more diseases. Aims and
Objective: The aim of this study was to investigate whether regular practice of Ujjayi Pranayama for 3 months can reduce the cardiovascular hyperreactivity (stress) induced by cold pressor test.
Materials and Methods: A total of 60 young healthy individual (35-male, 25-female) were selected who performed Ujjayi Pranayama for duration of 3 months. The cardiovascular hyperreactivity is recorded before and after the regular practice of Ujjayi Pranayama.
Results: Regular practice of Ujjayi Pranayama for 3 months significantly reduces the cardiovascular hyperreactivity in basal blood pressure (BP), rise in BP after 1 min of cold stress, pulse rate, and rate of respiration. Initially, there were 25 hyperreactors to cold pressor test which reduce to 11 after practicing Pranayama for 3 months. The remaining subjects also reduce their reactivity to cold stress. Conclusion: Ujjayi Pranayama can significantly decreases the stress induced changes in cardiovascular parameters because this leads to cardiovascular autonomic balance toward parasympathetic side and cortico-hypothalamo-medullary inhibition.