What are biologic rhythms? In essence, they're the rhythms of life. All forms of life on earth, including our bodies, respond rhythmically to the regular cycles of the sun, moon, and seasons.

For example, as night turns into day, vital body functions, including heart rate and blood pressure, speed up in anticipation of increased physical activity. These and other predictable fluctuations in body function, taking place during specific time cycles, are our biologic rhythms. They are regulated by "biologic clock" mechanisms located in the brain.

Although biologic rhythms can be "reprogrammed" by environmental influences (such as when a person regularly works the night shift and sleeps during the day), they are genetically "hard-wired" into our cells, tissues, and organs.

Medical chronobiologists have found that biologic rhythms can affect the severity of disease symptoms, diagnostic test results - even the body's response to drug therapy. Now these investigators are working to discover how the rhythms of life can be used to improve the practice of medicine - and your health.

These time-related medical observations, and others still in the exciting process of discovery, are rooted in chronobiology (chronos - time; bios - life; logos - science), the study of biologic rhythms.

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• Angina
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• Biologic Rhythms
• Biologic Rhythms & Symptoms of Illness
• Biologic Rhythms & Drugs
• Biologic Rhythms & Diagnostic Testing

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