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Abstract
Purpose: According to the World Health Organization, stress is a significant problem of our times and affects both physical as well as the mental health of people. Stress is defined as a situation where the organism's homeostasis is threatened or the organism perceives a situation as threatening.
Stress coping methods are the cognitive, behavioral and psychological efforts to deal with stress.
Method: After a thorough literature review in major databases (MEDLINE, Scopus, Science Direct) the following techniques were identified and are presented and briefly discussed here: progressive muscle relaxation, autogenic training, relaxation response, biofeedback, emotional freedom technique, guided imagery, diaphragmatic breathing, transcendental meditation, cognitive behavioral therapy, mindfulness-based stress reduction and emotional freedom technique.
Conclusion: These are all evidence-based techniques, easy to learn and practice, with good results in individuals with good health or with a disease.
Key words: stress, stress management techniques, evidence based techniques
Introduction
Life exists through the maintenance of a complex dynamic equilibrium, termed homeostasis, that is constantly challenged by internal or external adverse forces, termed stressors, which can be emotional or physical in nature. Thus, stress is defined as a state of threatened or perceived by the individual as threatened homeostasis and it is re-established by a complex repertoire of behavioural and physiologic adaptive responses of the organism 1. Neuroendocrinic hormones have a crucial role in coordinating basic as well as threatened homeostasis; also, they intervene in pathogenesis of dyshomeostatic or cacostatic situations of disease1.
The Stress System located both in the central and peripheral nervous system, generically activated whenever a threshold of any stressor is exceeded, plays a major coordinator role in the re-establishment of homeostasis by eliciting a complex behavioral and physical adaptive response. This response is defined as the stress syndrome and represents the unfolding of a relatively stereotypic, innate program of the organism that has evolved to coordinate homeostasis and protect the individual during stress1.
Stress, health and illness
According to the World Health Organization 2 stress, especially that relating to work, is the second most frequent health problem, impacting one third of employed people in the European Union.
There is a substantial body of research connecting stress to cardiovascular disease 3, the future manifestation of hypertension related to the individual's response to stress...