Introduction: Asthma is a common chronic inflammatory respiratory disease affecting about 300 million people worldwide. As a holistic therapy, yoga has the potential to relieve both the physical and psychological suffering of people with asthma, and its popularity has expanded globally. Yoga includes several techniques: physical postures (asanas), voluntarily regulated breathing (pranayama) and meditation.

Materials and Methods: Diagnosed patients of bronchial asthma, in the age group of 18-50 years, non-smokers, diagnosed with mild to moderate grades of disease, were recruited for the study. After a written informed consent, patients were randomized in two groups: Group A-Yoga group and group B-control group. Group A patients were trained in an integrated set of yoga exercises, including breathing exercises, suryanamaskar, yogasana (physical postures), pranayama (breath slowing techniques), dhyana (meditation) and were told to practice these exercises for 60 minutes daily and monitored weekly. Patients were counselled to maintain a diary record of number and severity of attacks, medication and doses used, record of their yoga exercises (group A patients) which was checked on weekly follow-up visits. Data at 4 weeks and 8 weeks follow-up were statistically analysed.

Results: Out of the total two hundred and six patients recruited for the study (Group A-92 and group B- 114), 23 and 39 were lost to follow-up or had poor record keeping/ irregular follow-up and were excluded respectively from the groups. Sixty best informants from each group were selected for final analysis. There was a significantly greater improvement in the group who practiced yoga in the weekly number of attacks of acute asthma, scores for drug treatment, and peak flow rate.

Conclusion: This study showed the efficacy of yoga in the long term management of bronchial asthma, but the physiological basis for this beneficial effect needs to be examined in more detail.

Amit Bery