With slow movements as fluid as silk, the gentle Chinese practice of Tai Chi seems tailor-made for easing sore joints and muscles . . .

Doctors recommend tai chi for people with a variety of musculoskeletal conditions because it improves flexibility and builds muscle strength gradually.

"There's no doubt that tai chi, done properly, can be a beneficial exercise for people with arthritis,"says Paul Lam, MD, a Sydney-based family practitioner and tai chi master who designed the Australian arthritis program.

Martin Lee, a tai chi authority and author of many books who has directed classes for years, says he has seen many people's overall health improve as they do tai chi. "Tai chi relieves stress,"he says. "It can be very healing."

Tai chi is an exercise almost anyone who can walk can do safely, says Dr. Lam, who began doing tai chi nearly 30 years ago for his own osteoarthritis. Tai chi takes the joints gently through their range of motion, he says, while the emphasis on breathingand inner stillness relieves stress and anxiety. Classes are inexpensive, and it can be practiced almost anywhere at any time, with no special equipment or clothing.

Peter Stein, MD, a Greenbrae, Calif., rheumatologist, says he finds tai chi especially good for people with fibromyalgia and those with a high level of muscle pain. "People in pain often can't even do yoga,"he says. "They need something milder and more soothing, and tai chi is very good for relieving pain."

. . . some physicians who treat the elderly or those with musculoskeletal conditions such as arthritis have been impressed by how tai chi improves pain, range of motion and physical balance.

What the Science Says

Several studies have shown that regular tai chi practice has benefits: It can reduce falls in the elderly or those with balance disorders — sometimes dramatically. In one 1996 Atlanta study, elderly people who practiced tai chi for 15 weeks reduced their risk of multiple falls by 47.5 percent. Falls are a particular danger for elders and others with brittle bones, or osteoporosis. For such people, falls frequently result in broken bones.

Research has shown tai chi has other benefits, too. Participants in the Atlanta study also had lower blood pressure at the end of the study; and a 1999 study that looked at people with multiple sclerosis who practiced tai chi found that it contributed to an overall improvement in quality of life for people with chronic, disabling conditions . . .

a study from 1991 that evaluates its safety for rheumatoid arthritis patients. It concluded that 10 weeks of tai chi classes did not make joint problems worse, and says the weight-bearing aspects of this exercise has the potential to stimulate bone growth and strengthen connective tissue.

And a recent University of Arizona opinion paper on mind-body alternatives, such as tai chi and meditation, for rheumatic diseases concluded that stress and pain are closely related, and therapies that focus on psychological as well as physical function could be beneficial, when used along with conventional medications . . .

"Given its low impact and evidence that it tends to increase muscle strength and balance and give general pain relief, we think it's a worthwhile option for arthritis patients,"says William L. Haskell, PhD, deputy director of the Stanford [University] Center for Research in Disease Prevention in California.

Stanford has offered tai chi classes for years, and is launching a major National Institute on Aging study to assess benefits of various types of exercise on healthy aging. A year-long study of tai chi for those 60 and older is part of the project. While this study won't look at arthritis specifically, the data is expected to provide evidence of tai chi's general benefits.

Tai Chi Chuan and Blood Pressure

(Reuters) - . . . at a meeting sponsored by the American Heart Association. "You better believe we were surprised by those results," one of the researchers, Dr. Deborah R.Young from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, MD said in a statement. "We were expecting to see significant changes in the aerobic exercise group and minimal changes in the T'ai chi group

The scientists studied 62 sedentary adults, aged 60 years and older, assigning half to a program of brisk walking and low-impact aerobics and the other half to learning T'ai chi. After 12 weeks, systolic blood pressure (the first number in a blood pressure reading) had fallen significantly in both groups, an average of 8.4 millimeters of mercury (mm Hg) in the aerobic exercise group and 7 mm Hg in the T'ai chi group. "It could be that in elderly, sedentary people, just getting up and doing some slow movement could be associated with beneficial reductions in high blood pressure," Young theorizes.

For more medical research, visit: http://www.williamccchen.com/Medical%20Studies.htm