Jin Shin Jyutsu shown effective in helping to treat traumatic brain injury

This results of this 2011 study by the University of Colorado Boulder, involving 38 study subjects, indicate a link between the Jin Shin Jyutsu treatments and enhanced cognitive function in study subjects with mild traumatic brain injury, or TBI.

“We found that the study subjects with mild traumatic brain injury who were treated with acupressure showed improved cognitive function, scoring significantly better on tests of working memory when compared to the TBI subjects in the placebo control group,” said CU-Boulder Professor Theresa Hernandez, lead study author.

The study subjects, each of whom was randomly assigned to one of two groups — an experimental group that received active acupressure treatments from trained experts, and a control group that received treatments from the same experts on places on the body that are not considered to be acupressure points, acting as a placebo. The study was “blinded,” meaning the researchers collecting data and the study participants themselves did not know who was in the experimental group or the placebo group until the end of the study.

“We were looking at synchronized neural activity in response to a stimulus, and our data suggest the brains of those in the active acupressure group responded differently when compared to those in the placebo acupressure group,” Hernandez said.

A paper on the subject was published in the January 2011 issue of the Journal of Neurotrauma, a peer-reviewed publication on the latest advances in both clinical and laboratory investigations of traumatic brain and spinal cord injury.

In a 2010 stroke study led by Hernandez, the researchers concluded that Jin Shin Jyutsu triggered a larger and faster relaxation response during active treatments and a decreased stress response following active treatments compared with what was seen in placebo treatments. Hernandez and her colleagues are embarking on a new study on the use of Jin Shin Jyutsu in athletes to see if the enhanced relaxation response and decreased stress seen in the stroke study can reduce the likelihood of athletic injury.