Yoga-based rehabilitation as beneficial as conventional cardiac rehabilitation for patients

New Delhi: According to a new study, a yoga-based rehabilitation program for heart attack patients is as safe and beneficial as conventional cardiac rehab therapy.

The results of this five-year study were presented Saturday during the scientific session of the American Heart Association in Chicago. It has been funded by the Indian Council for Medical Research (ICMR) and the Medical Research Council (UK).

The study compared the effectiveness of Yoga-Based Cardiac Rehabilitation (Yoga-CaRe) with improved standard care in patients with heart attacks on clinical outcomes such as death, recurrent heart attacks, accidents Stroke, heart-related urgent hospitalizations and quality of life Dr. Ambuj Roy, Professor of Cardiology at AIIMS.

The study revealed that Yoga-CaRe could be an alternative to conventional cardiac rehabilitation (CR) programs and address the unmet need for CR in patients in India and in other countries.

The study was conducted in 24 centers in India and covered nearly 4,000 patients at the time of their discharge from the hospital or immediately after their discharge following a heart attack.

Patients were randomized to follow a structured Yoga-CaRe program including meditation, breathing exercises and heart-shaped yoga poses, as well as lifestyle tips. The control group received the usual lifestyle tips.

The trial demonstrated that Yoga-CaRe is safe, feasible, and significantly improves the quality of life, and allows you to resume daily activities similar to those preceding the heart attack, said Dr. Roy.

Of the patients who attended at least 10 or more of the 13 scheduled yoga sessions, the Yoga-CaRe program improved clinical outcomes by reducing the number of deaths and the number of hospitalizations, suggesting a potential dose-response relationship.

Professor Prabhakaran, vice president of the Foundation for Public Health of India (PHFI) and senior researcher of the study said that the prevalence of ischemic heart disease in India had increased by more than 50% and that it had gone from 10 million in absolute terms to 1990 to 24 million in 2016.

"The Yoga-CaRe trial, the largest test of yoga and cardiac rehabilitation, has shown that yoga can be an alternative to conventional CP programs and address the unmet need for cardiac rehabilitation in low-income patients. It is safe, relatively inexpensive, does not require complex infrastructure, is culturally acceptable and improves the quality of life, "said Prabhakaran.

Professor Sanjay Kinra, Chief, Epidemiology, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, co-principal investigator of the study, said that improving heart care means that most people survive a heart attack and that the goal is now to improve the quality of life of patients. survivors of heart attacks so they can readjust better after such a catastrophic event.

"This is especially true in India, where heart attacks tend to occur at a very young age." While waiting for an official peer review, the preliminary results of our trial suggest that a cardiac rehabilitation program based on the Yoga could improve the quality of life and promote a faster return of children's usual activities, "he said.

Traditional cultural practices are often perceived with suspicion by the traditional medical community.

This major yoga test conducted with the highest scientific standards highlights the potential of traditional practices to play a complementary role in the provision of medical care, particularly given the high costs of chronic disease management, said Kinra .

"This historical study shows that the use of yoga as a CR tool is effective in improving the quality of life and reducing cardiovascular events in people who have completed at least 75% of sessions.

"Yoga has gained immense popularity as a health promotion tool nationally and internationally, especially after the proclamation of the International Day of Yoga by the United Nations on June 21. However, modern medicine requires evidence of the benefit of the interventions for its greater acceptance, especially among the medical research community.The study is a step in this direction and I hope that this study will lead to several trials of this magnitude and rigorously carried out in the field. other diseases where yoga can be potentially beneficial, he said.

The Yoga-CaRe program is an amalgam of generic yoga and lifestyle practices influenced by both yoga philosophies and modern scientific evidence in a systematic process.

The program is designed to be accepted by people of all religions / sects and is safe for patients.

The authors reported that preliminary results of the trial revealed significant changes in quality of life and return to normal activities after a heart attack in patients enrolled in the Yoga-CaRe program.

However, there has been no change in smoking cessation and adherence to drug treatment.

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