On August 31, Osher Center practitioner Dr. Wolf Mehling will present Researching Body Awareness at the 2012 Feldenkrais Method Annual Conference, entitled “Embodying Neuroscinece: The Feldenkrais Method in Human Development, Performance & Health.” Dr. Mehling will present his research on body awareness, how to measure it and how to understand the complex concept from different perspectives in science and society.  The conference is open to the public, as well as Feldenkrais practitioners and trainees.

Dr. Mehling will also be presenting at a conference in Berlin, Germany on August 22, on “Fortschritte in der Mind/Body Medizin und ihre Bedeutung für Atem-und Körpertherapie,” about new research in mind-body medicine with implications for breath and body therapies, at the Immanuel Hospital, Department for Integrative Medicine.

Nancy Bardacke, RN, CNM, MA  has authored a groundbreaking book called Mindful Birthing: Training the Mind, Body, and Heart for Childbirth and Beyond, that will be published by HarperOne July 10, 2012. Nancy, a nurse-midwife with and the founding director of the Mindfulness-Based Childbirth and Parenting program that she leads at the Osher Center, has created a program where expectant parents can learn ways to apply mindfulness practice to their lives.

With four decades of midwifery experience helping pregnant, birthing, and postpartum families, her book shares her innovative prenatal education program for pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting, in which expectant parents can learn mindfulness for increasing calm and ease during the transformational times of pregnancy and childbirth, as well as gain lifelong skills for healthy living and wise parenting.  Included are ways to increase confidence and decrease fear of childbirth, improve couple communication, and provide stress reduction techniques for overall well-being. The program draws from research in the areas of neuroscience, mindfulness meditation, and mind/body medicine.

According to Andrew Weil, MD, “Bringing mindfulness to the birthing process has everything to recommend it:  it can reduce fear and stress and make the experience more rewarding for all involved. All that’s required is to practice the techniques that Nancy Bardacke explains so clearly in this book.”

The cover of the April 2012 issue of Molecular Medicine featured Osher Center research on the “calm mouse model” of stress reduction, which was was led by Osher Fellow Blake Gurfein, PhD. In this study, mice were placed in cages with enhancements designed to reduce stress, and several physiological measurements were compared within four intervention and control groups.

The results suggest that the calm mouse model represents a promising approach to studying the biological effects of stress reduction in the context of health and in conjunction with existing disease models.

The research team includes: Blake T Gurfein, Andrew W Stamm, Peter Bacchetti, Mary F Dallman, Nachiket A Nadkarni, Jeffrey M Milush, Chadi Touma, Rupert Palme, Charles Pozzo Di Borgo, Gilles Fromentin, Rachel Lown-Hecht, Jan Pieter Konsman, Michael Acree, Mary Premenko-Lanier, Nicolas Darcel, Frederick M Hecht, and Douglas F Nixon.

Links:

• Full issue
• Full article and supplemental data (PDFs)
• Full-size cover (PDF)

The 14th Annual Integrative Medicine Forum is a one-day event featuring speakers and workshops on a variety of topics related to complementary and alternative medicine, sponsored by UCSF students’ Integrative Medicine Network. The theme of this year’s forum is “An Integrative Approach to Managing Stress,” and will feature topics such as acupuncture, massage, yoga, meditation, sound healing, and guided imagery, among many more. Several Osher Center practitioners will be presenting this year, including: Dr. Kevin Barrows, Priscilla Abercrombie, Marcia Degelman, and Renee Rivera. The event will be held on Saturday, May 19 from 9:00 am until 4:30 pm on the Parnassus campus, and the cost is just $15 for the public and $8 for UCSF students. For more information or to register, please visit this website.

Researchers at the Osher Center for Integrative Medicine will be playing an important role at the upcoming 2012 Integrative Medicine & Health International Research Congress, sponsored by the Consortium of Academic Health Centers for Integrative Medicine, to be held May 15-18 in Portland, Oregon. This meeting is perhaps the most comprehensive scientific conference in complementary and integrative medicine that has been held, and it will bring together hundreds of top researchers in integrative medicine from over thirty countries. The Osher Center’s Director of Research, Dr. Frederick (Rick) Hecht, is the Program Chair for the conference, and over a dozen Osher Center researchers will be presenting their most recent work, as well as leading several symposium sessions. These presenters include: Priscilla Abercrombie, Donald Abrams, Shelley Adler, Maria Chao, Margaret Chesney, Sarah Corey, Yvette Coulter, Jennifer Daubenmier, Anand Dhruva, Blake Gurfein, Kelly McDermott, Wolf Mehling, and Erica Weston.

Thanks to UCTV and their relationship with iTunesU, the video of Dr. Sanford Newmark’s Lunchtime Lecture entitled “Do 2.5 Million Children Really Need Ritalin? An Integrative Approach to ADHD” has now been viewed by over 3 million people! iTunesU has featured a series of UC lectures on The Human Brain on their homepage, and Dr. Newmark’s lecture has the second highest ratings in that series.

Dr. Newmark is the head of the Osher Center’s Neurodevelomental Pediatrics practice, which specializes in treating children with autism, ADHD, and related conditions. He has also authored the popular book “ADHD Without Drugs: A Guide to the Natural Care of Children with ADHD,” and was recently interviewed on NPR station KQED’s Forum.

Also on that list in seventh place, with over 1 million views, is another Osher Center lecture, part of the Pritzker Lecture Series, Dr. Ronald Dahl speaking on “Adolescent Brain Development: Understanding Unique Opportunities for Early-Intervention & Prevention.”

Leland Kim, of the UCSF News Center, has written an article and created a video about our free classes for cancer patients and their caregivers, co-sponsored by The Osher Center for Integrative Medicine and the Cancer Resource Center. It includes touching interviews with the class participants, as well as their instructor, Joseph Acquah, our integrative oncologist, Donald Abrams, and our Director, Margaret Chesney.

One participant, diagnosed with breast cancer in the summer of 2009, joined the integrative medicine classes at Osher to the standard recovery regimen after several rounds of chemotherapy treatments exhausted her. She says of her QiGong class, “It’s a very relaxing class, so you really learn to slow down. It allows me to focus on my movements, where my hands are, where my feet are, and it’s stress reduction.” Read more.

Concerned about reducing your risk of breast cancer or breast cancer recurrence? Want to use nutrition and other integrative strategies? Dr. Helayne Waldman, Ed.D., CNE, author of The Whole Food Guide for Breast Cancer Survivors can help show you how. By looking at what you eat and how it affects your levels of inflammation, blood sugar, nutrient sufficiency and other critical indicators of risk, you can develop a customized plan designed to create a cancer‑deterrence system that’s unique to your own biochemistry. In other words, whatever your level of current risk, it can be lowered. Donald I. Abrams, MD, Integrative Oncologist at the UCSF Osher Center for Integrative Medicine will provide introductory comments and moderate the evening’s session. All are welcome. Event web page.

An Integrative Guide to Breast Cancer Risk Reduction
With author Dr. Helayne Waldman, Ed.D., CNE
Introduction by Donald Abrams, MD

Wednesday, April 4, 2012
5:30 – 7:00 p.m.
UCSF Mt. Zion Herbst Hall, 2nd Floor
1600 Divisadero Street, San Francisco
This event is free, but please call to register: (415) 885‑3693.