Prospective study of new participants in a community-based mind-body training program.
BACKGROUND
Mind-body practices such as yoga are widely popular, but little is known about how such exercises impact health-related quality of life.


OBJECTIVE
To measure changes in health-related quality of life associated with 3 months of mind-body training as practiced in community-based settings.


METHODS
Prospective cohort study.


METHODS
Eight centers for practice of mind-body training.


METHODS
One hundred ninety-four English-speaking adults who had taken no more than 10 classes at the centers prior to enrollment in the study. One hundred seventy-one (88%) returned the 3-month follow-up questionnaire.


METHODS
Administration of the SF-36 questionnaire at the start of training and after 3 months.


RESULTS
At baseline, new participants in mind-body training reported lower scores than U.S. norms for 7 of 8 domains of the SF-36: mental health, role emotional, social, vitality, general health, body pain, and role physical (P <.002 for all comparisons). After 3 months of training, within-patient change scores improved in all domains (P <.0001), including a change of +15.5 (standard deviation +/-21) in the mental health domain. In hierarchical regression analysis, younger age (P=.0003), baseline level of depressive symptoms (P=.01), and reporting a history of hypertension (P=.0054) were independent predictors of greater improvement in the SF-36 mental health score. Five participants (2.9%) reported a musculoskeletal injury.


CONCLUSIONS
New participants in a community-based mind-body training program reported poor health-related quality of life at baseline and moderate improvements after 3 months of practice. Randomized trials are needed to determine whether benefits may be generalizable to physician-referred populations.
Lee
Sung W
SW
Center for Complementary and Integrative Medicine, Weill Medical College of Cornell University, New York, NY, USA. SWL9001@med.cornell.edu
Mancuso
Carol A
CA
Charlson
Mary E
ME
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001007:Anxiety / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000517:prevention & control; D001945:Breathing Exercises; D015331:Cohort Studies; D003863:Depression / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000517:prevention & control; D015444:Exercise / Q000502:physiology / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011446:Prospective Studies; D011603:Psychophysiology; D011788:Quality of Life; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012111:Residence Characteristics; D020377:Self Efficacy; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D015013:Yoga / Q000523:psychology