stress-related disease outcomes. Given that brief mindfulness
meditation training increased cortisol reactivity, one
possibility is that these increases in cortisol may blunt
stress-related increases in inflammation via HPA-axis nega-
tive feedback (Barnes et al., 1993; Steptoe et al., 2007),
but we note that longer-term mindfulness meditation train-
ing may be needed for clinically meaningful health benefits
in at-risk stressed patient populations.