Yoga May Help Low Back Pain

According to the National Institutes of Health’s National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health (NCCIH), low-back pain is the most common cause of job-related disability, and a major contributor to physician visits and lost work days. About 80% of adults experience low-back pain at some point in their lives. While most episodes last for just four weeks, termed acute, for chronic sufferers, the pain lasts for 12 weeks or longer. Treatment can relieve symptoms, but in some cases pain persists.

The NCCIH has compiled recent research on the effects of yoga on sufferers of chronic low-back pain:

• Clinical practice guidelines issued by the American College of Physicians in 2017 strongly recommended yoga, based on low-quality evidence, as initial treatment for chronic low-back pain. A systematic review supporting the guidelines found that yoga was associated with lower pain scores, although the effects were small and not always statistically significant.
• A 2020 review of 25 randomized controlled trials examining the effects of yoga on back pain, published in Holistic Nursing Practice, found that 20 studies reported positive outcomes in pain, depression, anxiety, and other variables. At six weeks, however, there was no significant difference in the treatment’s effect on pain and disability.

Low-back pain is the most common cause of job-related disability.

• A 2018 Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality report evaluating eight trials of yoga for low-back pain trials found yoga improved pain and function in the short and intermediate term.
• A review of 12 trials by Cochrane found that yoga compared to non-exercise controls may be slightly more effective for pain at three and six months.
• A 2017 trial involving low-income, racially diverse participants, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine, found yoga and physical therapy offered similar benefits.
• Analyses of data from 28 trials of mind and body therapies, including yoga,  showed participants in the yoga group had small health benefits. The 2018 report was published by the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review.