Yoga for Family Caregivers of Alzheimers Disease Patient

A Yoga and Compassion Meditation Program Improve Quality of Life and Self-compassion in Family Caregivers of Alzheimer's Disease Patients: a Randomized Controlled Trial

This study evaluates the effects of the practice of yoga in combination with compassion meditation on the quality of life, attention, vitality and self-compassion of family caregivers of patients with Alzheimer's disease.

Alzheimer's disease is a progressive brain disorder that involves the loss of reasoning, memory, language and the ability to live independently. Thus, patients who suffer from this disease often require care from another person and must adapt to ensure their health, functional capacity and safety. Caregivers have a poor quality of life due to the physical and psychological burden of caregiving. Such physical, psychological, social and financial burden can increase the risk of death. Within this scenario, techniques such as yoga and meditation have emerged as low-cost interventions that offer little or no risk to the practitioners. Yoga seeks to develop health and attention through physical postures, breathing exercises and formal meditative practices.

The duration of this group was 8 weeks. The program included sessions 3 times per week, with each session lasting 1 hour and 15 minutes. The volunteers performed yoga classes composed of "asana" (poses), "pranayama" (breathing exercise) and meditation.

25 min of physical exercise, holding each pose (stretching exercise) for an average of 1 min and 30 s; 25 min of breathing exercises and 25 min of meditation.

Inclusion Criteria: be a family caregiver of Alzheimer disease patient age over 18 years completed at least the primary education level at least at the phase of stress resistance according to Lipp's Inventory of Stress Symptoms for adults Exclusion Criteria: patient with asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) alcohol use (more than 5 drinks per week) or use of drugs-of-abuse; suffer from Cushing's syndrome under treatment with topical, nasal or any form of steroids within the last 30 days practice yoga, meditation or similar techniques

Danucalov MA, Kozasa EH, Ribas KT, Galduroz JC, Garcia MC, Verreschi IT, Oliveira KC, Romani de Oliveira L, Leite JR. A yoga and compassion meditation program reduces stress in familial caregivers of Alzheimer's disease patients. Evid Based Complement Alternat Med. 2013;2013:513149. doi: 10.1155/2013/513149. Epub 2013 Apr 18.

A yoga and compassion meditation program reduces stress in familial caregivers of Alzheimer's disease patients