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Objectives: Elderly people are more prone to decline in cognitive functions, This study was amied to observe the effect of mindfulness meditation on the attention and executive functions in elderly people. Methods: In this case control study 100 elderly people (>60 year old) were randomly divided into study (meditating) group (n=50) and control (non-meditating) group (n=50). Meditation group did mindfulness meditation for 45day (half an hour/day, for 6 days in a week). Before and after the study period attention and executive function of both groups were assessed by Trail making test(TMT) type "A "and type "B". Statistical analysis was done by using independent and paired student"s t test. P value ≤ 0.05 was taken as significant. Results: Between both the groups, there were no significant different in the baseline scores for TMT type A (p value =0.06) and type B (p value = 0.91.After study period, significant improvement were noticed in the scores of TMT type "A" scores (p =0 .036) and type "B" scores (p =0.002) for the study group. On the other hand there were no significant variations in the TMT type A (P = 0.663) and type B (p= .239) scores of control group. Conclusions: This study showed that, mindfulness meditation practice has positive effect on the attention and executive functions in elderly people. Regular mindfulness meditation may improve the quality of life.

Heart rate variability (HRV) is the simplest and most widely performed measure of cardiac autonomic function.Decreased HRV implicates an increased risk of arrhythmic events and an increased mortality. HRV is influenced by genetic, many environmental andbehavioral factors.The present study was an attempt to investigate the difference in the HRV between the people of same origin but born and brought up in a different social, environmental and cultural set up i.e. between the young Indian females and young Non-resident Indian (NRI) females.HRV of Sixteen Indian femalesstudents of mean age 18.41±0.5and seventeen NRI females students of mean age 18.63±0.5 were analyzed using HRV software.HRV was analyzed both by time domain and frequency domain methods during normal breathing.We observed that there was no statistical significant difference in the heart rate variability of Indians and NRIs. But the values of all the variables of time domain method and HF power andHFnu by frequency domain method during normal breathing were higher in Indians, which shows that probably Indians have a better parasympathetic tone compared to NRIs but it did not reach statistical significance level because of smaller sample size.