Yoga, The Integrate Form of Exercise In the Prevention and Treatment of Maternal Anxiety

By Kyle J. Norton (Master of Nutrition, All right reserved)

Yoga may be used as a potential treatment in reduced anxiety in maternal women, a study by the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Québec suggested.

Maternal anxiety is a condition which appears during pregnancy characterized by a state of excessive uneasiness and apprehension, typically with compulsive behavior or panic attacks.

Some researchers suggested that anxiety may be attributed to the overreaction of the sympathetic nervous system that has a function to prepare our body for emergency and the conscious or even unconscious mind in cases of a need for defense.

The reaction sympathetic nervous system causes overproduction of certain hormones which in turn, induce the imbalance of the stress hormones in the body such as adrenaline and cortisol, and the precursor hormone DHEA, affecting a person psychological wellbeing in the initiation of anxiety.

Researchers do not know why some people are susceptible to the risk of anxiety, while others do not. However, they do know certain factors such as gene inherited from the parents, family history, gender and people with stressful and traumatic life experiences and people who are drugs abusers are associated with increased risk of anxiety.

Most symptoms of maternal anxiety include feeling unable to cope. very alone and frightened. depressed. disconnected from self and/or the baby. anxious about the baby. and seeing everything as stressful. particularly a feeling of not able to “let go” and relax.

In some women, irreparable effects of anxiety during pregnancy can change pregnancy into an unpleasant event of women’s life, affecting some serious effects in the offspring’s health.

Yoga, the ancient technique practice for harmonized external and internal body well being, through breath control, meditation, bodily movement, and gesture.....

The technique has been well known for people in the Western world and some parts in Asia, due to health benefits reported by various respectable institutes' research and supported by health advocates.

In the review of literature posted in Cochrane Pregnancy and Childbirth Group's Trials Register (30 November 2010), MEDLINE (1950 to 30 November 2010), EMBASE (1974 to 30 November 2010), the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) (1 December 2010), ClinicalTrials.gov (December 2010) and Current Controlled Trials (1 December 2010) involving pregnant women of any age at any time from conception to one month after birth, researchers found that 

* In compared with usual care, yoga and other techniques with mind-body interventions in one study with 133 women expressed a positive effect on anxiety during labor decreasing anxiety at the early and middle stages of labor.

* Another study also suggested that yoga and other techniques with mind-body interventions had a positive effect on anxiety and depression in the immediate postpartum period

Dr. Marc I, the lead author said, "Mind-body interventions might benefit women's anxiety during pregnancy" and " there is some but no strong evidence for the effectiveness of mind-body interventions for the management of anxiety during pregnancy".

Even with these favorable outcomes,  researchers in the review still concern of the small number of studies per intervention and to the diversity of outcome measurements with no meta-analysis.

Other, also in the review of literature from in four major electronic databases: CINAHL, PubMed, PsycINFO, and EMBASE using Following PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) guidelines with 13 publications met inclusion criteria and selected. researchers indicated that most studies expressed a generally effective in reducing anxiety in pregnant women participated in yoga class.

Not only that, Dr. Sheffield KM, the lead author said, " The use of yoga in the perinatal period shows promise in improving mental health and well-being for women and infants".

Truly, yoga meditation and mindfulness only calm the nervous system in the modulation of hormones production without inducing overexpression of certain hormones which may cause anxiety but also
bring the prenatal mother back to the present and deal the situation in a thoughtful way.

These results may restore the feeling of joy, connection with the baby, the happiness that the baby will bring, the pleasure to have a baby and a feeling of comfort in the belly that carries the baby, etc.

In support of the above analysis, a joint study conducted by the University of Manchester in 59 primiparous, low-risk pregnant women completed questionnaires assessing state (State-Trait Anxiety Inventory; STAI-State), trait (STAI-Trait), and pregnancy-specific anxiety (Wijma Delivery Expectancy Questionnaire; WDEQ) and depression (Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale; EPDS) before randomization (baseline) to either an 8-week course of antenatal yoga or treatment-as-usual (TAU); both groups repeated the questionnaires at follow-up, showed that
* Compared to the control group, yoga participated group in one single class showed to reduce both subjective and physiological measures of state anxiety (STAI-S and cortisol), and

* This single class-induced reduction remained through the final session of the intervention

* Yoga group also improved the reduction in WDEQ score

After adjusting to other risk factors, researchers said, " Antenatal yoga seems to be useful for reducing women's anxieties toward childbirth and preventing increases in depressive symptomatology".

Taking all together, there is no doubt that yoga may be considered a potential and therapeutic treatment in reducing risk and symptoms and treatment of anxiety maternally.

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Author Biography
Kyle J. Norton (Scholar, Master of Nutrition, All right reserved)
Health article writer and researcher; Over 10.000 articles and research papers have been written and published online, including worldwide health, ezine articles, article base, health blog, self-growth, best before it's news, the karate GB daily, etc.,.
Named TOP 50 MEDICAL ESSAYS FOR ARTISTS & AUTHORS TO READ by Disilgold.com Named 50 of the best health Tweeters Canada - Huffington Post
Nominated for shorty award over last 4 years
Some articles have been used as references in medical research, such as international journal Pharma and Bioscience, ISSN 0975-6299.

Sources
(1) Mind-body interventions during pregnancy for preventing or treating women's anxiety byMarc I1, Toureche N, Ernst E, Hodnett ED, Blanchet C, Dodin S, Njoya MM. (PubMed)
(2) Efficacy, Feasibility, and Acceptability of Perinatal Yoga on Women's Mental Health and Well-Being: A Systematic Literature Review by Sheffield KM1, Woods-Giscombé CL2.(PubMed)
(3)  Effects of antenatal yoga on maternal anxiety and depression: a randomized controlled trial by Newham JJ1, Wittkowski A, Hurley J, Aplin JD, Westwood M.(PubMed)