As if you needed one more reason why yoga is worth at least trying... a new study reveals that yoga may be just what you need for your aching back! The Warrior, Cobra and the Supine Butterfly are just a few of the poses that may do the trick.
A recent study of 101 adults with chronic lower back pain had researchers comparing the benefits of yoga, conventional therapeutic exercise, and the information contained in a popular back pain book. You may be surprised to know that those who took one yoga class weekly for 12 weeks showed the biggest increase in functionality and the biggest decrease in the need for pain killers.
"The study suggests that for people who are looking to do something for themselves, you could clearly say that yoga is the best," Karen Sherman, an epidemiologist, researcher and the lead author of the study told Forbes magazine.
For the study, Sherman and her colleagues chose subjects between 20 and 64 years old who suffered from chronic (but not serious) back pain. People she described as seeing a primary care physician when their backs were bothering them and they didn't feel well.
The participants (who were divided into the three groups mentioned above) were mostly women in their 40s. They were interviewed four times during the 26-week study, including before beginning the study and 26 weeks after completing it, to assess their ability to do daily tasks, pain levels and how much pain medication they took.
All three groups reported improvement, but 78% of the yoga group improving by at least two points on a standardized scale that assesses how people can perform daily tasks, like climbing stairs without pain or bending down to tie their shoes. Sixty-three percent who took the exercise class reported at least a two-point improvement, and just 47% of those who read the book reported a similar benefit.
By the end of the 26 weeks, compared to 58% of the yoga students who were taking medication for pain when they started Sherman reported that only 21% in the yoga class were taking pain killers! The exercise group participant's pain medication usage dropped from 57% to 50% and book readers actually increased their pain medication usage from 50% to 59%.
Sherman asserts that yoga's effectiveness in helping with back pain may be due to people's general lack of awareness about how they move. That, and she says, the breathing that is a component of yoga makes people more conscious of their bodies and how to handle themselves better to avoid injury and pain.
According to the researcher, this is the largest study done to date that compared different therapies for chronic, low back pain. If your back is sore, what are you waiting for? Find out where you can take a yoga class in your community.
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