Massage Article in New York Times

New York Times ran an article about a study on the benefits of massage.I have already written about massage on another post. I would not mind having two or three a week. You need a massage after you work out or dance for several hours. The study was published in The Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine. The lead author was Dr. Mark Hyman Rapaport, chairman of psychiatry and behavioral neurosciences at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California. A total of fifty-three adults were randomly assigned: 29 of them to a 45-minute session of deep-tissue Swedish massage and 24 of them to a session of light massage. Blood samples were taken before and up to an hour into the massage intravenously. 

Each massage had its benefits. The Swedish group experienced significant decreases in levels of  stress hormone cortisol in blood and saliva, and in arginin vasopressin, a hormone that can lead to increases in cortisol. Their number of lymphocytes increased. The light massage group experienced greater increases in oxytocin, a hormone associated with contentment and larger decreases in adrenal corticotropin hormone, which stimulates the adrenal glands to release cortisol.

See http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/21/health/research/21regimens.html?_r=1