Efficacy of yoga poses on physical fitness and severity of premenstrual syndrome in Thai female adolescents

Abstract

This study has assessed whether yoga is able to alleviate severity of premenstrual syndrome (PMS) in adolescent girls. Totally, 48 female volunteers with PMS in the age group of 18-22 years were included in the study and randomly assigned to a yoga group (n=24) and a control group (n=24). Physical fitness and severity of PMS were evaluated at baseline and at the end of the study. The yoga group was asked to practice yoga poses for 30 minutes/day, 2 days/week for 12 weeks at home while the control group did not receive any intervention. The results showed that physical fitness including back muscle strength, leg muscle strength, and flexibility in yoga group were significant greater than control group (p< 0.05).A significant reduction in irritability, mood swings, poor concentration, back pain, menstrual pain and leg pain were found only in yoga group (p < 0.05). These findings suggest that yoga poses in this study are safe, and effective to alleviate PMS. Therefore, yoga may be promoted as analternative primary care of adolescent girl with PMS.