Mindfulness training shows promise for people with MS

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-05/osu-mts051820.php

News Release 18-May-2020
Ohio State University


New research suggests mindfulness training may help multiple sclerosis patients in two very different ways: regulating negative emotions and improving processing speed.

People with MS who underwent the four-week mindfulness training not only improved more compared to those who did nothing - they also improved compared to those who tried another treatment, called adaptive cognitive training.

"This was a small pilot study, so we need to replicate the results, but these findings were very encouraging," said Ruchika Prakash, corresponding author of the research and associate professor of psychology at The Ohio State University.

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In a secondary analysis of the same study, led by doctoral student Heena Manglani, participants were assessed on their processing speed and working memory, two cognitive functions that often decline in MS patients. They also completed additional measures of cognitive functioning.

Processing speed is the time it takes a person to complete mental tasks and is related to how well they can understand and react to the information they receive.

Findings showed that after four weeks of mindfulness training, MS patients showed significantly improved processing speed based on the tests used in the study - more so than those in the other two groups.

"This is an exciting finding because processing speed is a core cognitive domain impacted in multiple sclerosis," Prakash said.

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Prakash and her team are now working on replicating this pilot study with a larger sample.