Claudia Scherding(Osteopathie Schule Deutschland) investigated the influence of 3 osteopathic treatments on the subjective perception of patients with moderate to severe depression and their heart rate variability (adaptability of the heart).the results show highly significant successes. The patients’ perception and the severity of the depression improved significantly, and a major improvement in heart rate variability was also demonstrated as a result of osteopathic treatments.
If you are interested in the exact data:
Methods: On three appointments, HRV and well-being were measured in each subject before and after a 15-minute standardized osteopathic treatment, sham treatment or rest phase. An individual osteopathic treatment followed the rest phase. The severity of depression was assessed by the BDI-II questionnaire before the first and after the last intervention: ANOVA shows a significant interaction effect (treatment x pre-post) for the HRV parameters heart rate (p=0.019), mean RR distance (p=0.013), pNN50 (p=0.033), RMSSD (p=0.005), SD1 (p=0.004) and subjective well-being (p=0.000). Osteopathic treatment had the greatest effect on these time-related HRV parameters and subjective well-being in depression compared to touch and rest. The severity of depression, measured using the BDI-II at the beginning and end of the study, showed a highly significant (p=0.000) reduction from 30.25 ± 7.02 to 22.82 ± 6.74.
