Category: Complementary Integrative Rehabilitation Medicine; Lifestyle Medicine; Geriatric Rehabilitation
Objective :
To determine if a) Yoga instructors (YI) perform screening prior to starting clients' Yoga programs and b) there are relationships between prescreening and clients' Yoga-related injuries.
Design : Cross-sectional design.
Setting : General community.
Participants (or Animals, Specimens, Cadavers) : YI (N = 214; Women, n = 194; Men, n = 20) practicing in the Northeastern United States.
Interventions : Not applicable.
Main Outcome Measure(s) : A 57-item customized YI questionnaire regarding performance of medical, symptoms, and performance screening, and yoga-related injuries.
Results :
The response rate of our questionnaire was 26.3%. Before starting yoga programs with their clients, only 35%of YIs performed medical screening. Of those YI who performed medical screening, only 12.2% of them modified their Yoga routines due to this assessment. Most YIs (85.2%) performed symptom prescreening with their clients' pain being the most frequently assessed (53.0%); however, only 4.4% of those practitioners that performed symptom screening modified their client's yoga routines based on client's symptoms. Only 10.1% of the YIs performed physical performance prescreening with client's flexibility being assessed most frequently (73.7%). Of the YIs who performed performance testing, only 4.35% used this information to modify a client's Yoga program. Almost 25% of the YIs reported yoga-related injuries in clients with strains/sprains being the most widely reported (78.05%). Chi-Square showed significant relationships between client injuries and medical (χ2(4)=37.4), symptoms (χ2(4)=52.7), and physical performance screening (χ2(4)=62.6) performed by YIs; all P < 0.001. Multinomial logistic regression showed that physical performance screening was the only predictor of injuries due to yoga (P < 0.001).
Conclusions : Prescreening, especially physical performance testing is important to potentially prevent yoga-related injuries in yoga clients. Thus, clinician-performed screening is important prior to their patients starting yoga programs.
Harshvardhan Singh
– Assistant Professor, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AlabamaSoJung Kim
– Assistant Professor, University of Massachusetts Lowell, Lowell, MassachusettsDonald Lein, Jr.
– Associate Professor, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AlabamaWilliam Reed
– Associate Professor, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama