The Effect of Yoga Exercises on Lumbar Range of Motion,Pain and Functional Disability in Women with ChronicLumbar Disk Herniation: A Randomized Controlled Study

Chronic low back pain is one of the most important and common indust-rial societies’ problems and the significant cause of disability. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of yoga exercises on spinal flexibility، pain and functional disability in women with chronic lumbar disk herniation. This double-blind randomized controlled trial was performed in Zahedanin 2010. Twenty-eight patients with chronic lumbar disk herniation were randomly assigned to either a Yoga (n=14) or a general exercises group (n=14). Before and after intervention، we assessed pain through Visual Analogue Scale (VAS)، Depression with Beck Depression Invent-ory II (BDI-II)، lumbar lordosis with flexi-ble ruler، range of lumbar flexion using Modified Schober test، and disability with The Oswestry Disability Index (ODI). The treatment program was 16 sessions of exer-cise which lasted 8 weeks and was perfor-med twice per week. Data were analyzed using paired and independent t-test in SPSS Version 17 software. The mean pain was decreased from 6. 7±1. 1 to 3. 4±1. 4 in the yoga group and from 6. 5±0. 9 to 3. 7±0. 9 in the general group (P<0. 0001). The mean disability، depression andlordosis were decreased and range of lumbar flexion was increased in both groups (P<0. 0001). There was no sign-ificant difference between two groups rega-rding to all study variables (P>0. 05). Discussion & The results showed that both yoga and general exerc-ises decreases pain، disability، depression and angle of lumbar lordosis and increases range of lumbar flexion in women with chronic lumbar disk herniation.