In February, 2002, the world's leading asthma research journal, Thorax, published a scientific article describing the benefits of sahaja yoga for people with asthma. This is the result of a scientific trial of sahaja yoga at a highly respected asthma research institution in Australia which began in 1997 and finished in 1999.
The trial was a very thorough, objective assessment of the effects of a 16 week sahaja yoga programme on people with severe asthma who were not improving despite being on maximum levels of normal medicines.
The results were compared to a parallel group who learned a standard stress management strategy designed for asthma sufferers. The end result showed that Sahaja Yoga was superior becasue it brought about significantly greater psychological improvements and also appeared to actually reduce the severity of the disease process itself!
The value of this publication is that it shows that Sahaja Yoga Meditation is more than just relaxation, that it actually has a measurable therapeutic effect and that these are observation made by objective researchers who are recognised for their expertise in asthma research.
This is the first of a number of projects using scientific research methods, the highest possible standards of evaluation in conjunction with respectable and unbiased institutions to evaluate the effects of sahaja yoga meditation. | 
