Diseases & Conditions / Multiple Sclerosis
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Multiple Sclerosis: Exercise, Yoga Help
Updated 4/7/2003 3:42:46 PM By Daniel DeNoon
April 4, 2003 -- There's good news for people with multiple sclerosis. Exercise and yoga help relieve the awful fatigue that often plagues multiple sclerosis patients. The finding comes from a study reported at this week's meeting of the American Academy of Neurology held in Honolulu, Hawaii. Barry Oken, MD, a neurology professor at Oregon Health & Sciences University, led a research team that worked with 69 MS patients. The patients drew random assignments. Some patients got no assistance. Some got weekly exercise classes on a stationary bike, with home exercise. And some got a weekly class in Iyengar yoga, with home practice. Iyengar yoga stresses a series of yoga postures, particularly standing ones. Unlike more strict regimens, it lets people use props -- such as chairs and belts -- that help them get into proper yoga positions. The multiple sclerosis patients who didn't get exercise or yoga were put on a waiting list and offered classes after the study. "There was a significant improvement in fatigue for the two intervention groups when compared to the waiting-list group," Oken says in a news release. Oken is director of the OHSU Oregon Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine in Neurological Disorders. Neither yoga nor exercise improved mental function, however. Oken's team is now studying whether healthy, aging people benefit from yoga or exercise. SOURCES: American Academy of Neurology presentation abstract, Oken et al., April 3, 2003. News release, Oregon Health & Science University.    |
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