Changes in blood pressure, body weight and urinary catecholamines during austerities.

Abstract

More than one hundred monks belonging to Nichirenshu, a major Buddhist sect in Japan, participated in the annual hundred days austerities during the winter. Cold water bathing, insufficient sleep, hunger and emotional impact are considered to be the major stressors experienced by the monks subjected to these austere regimes. This study was conducted to evaluate the endocrinological and physiological changes in twenty newcomer monks during the first four weeks of the austerities. The urinary concentration of noradrenaline (NOR) increased significantly during the first four weeks but not that of adrenaline (ADR). The changes in urinary concentration of ADR and NOR indicated the main stressors possibly to be low ambient temperature and hunger. NOR is thus probably a better indicator than ADR for evaluating stress under austere conditions. Blood pressure (BP) did not rise but the concentration of NOR was noted to increase. NOR may possibly be excreted in excessive amounts to maintain normal BP against hypotensive factors such as loss of body weight due to low calorie intake.