Just one yoga class and one jogging session a week could cut your risk in half of developing heart disease, a study claims.
Researchers studied how the combination of yoga and aerobic exercise can impact someone’s blood pressure, body mass index and cholesterol levels.
About 610,000 people die of heart disease every year in the United States, which is almost one in every four people.
The findings suggest that combining yoga and aerobics doubles the positive health effects and could be imperative for those who want to lessen their risk of developing heart disease.
The combination of one yoga class and one jogging session per week can cut someone’s risk of developing heart disease in half. About 610,000 people die from heart disease in the US, and experts say this study could decrease symptoms that lead to cardiovascular problems
Researchers from HG SMS Hospital in Jaipur, India, presented the study at the 8th Emirates Cardiac Society Congress in collaboration with the American College of Cardiology Middle East Conference.
The study looked at 750 patients who had previously been diagnosed with coronary heart disease.
One group of 225 patients participated in aerobic exercise, another group of 240 patients participated in yoga, and a third group of 285 participated in both yoga and aerobic exercise.
Each group did three, six-month sessions of their assigned exercises.
Yoga was picked as one the the forms of exercise because of its practice of strengthening the body, mind and soul.
Heart disease patients could benefit from learning Indian yoga and making it a routine part of daily life
Dr Sonal Tanwar, a scholar in preventative cardiology, and Dr Naresh Sen, a consultant cardiologist
The exercise focuses on connecting the mind to the body through poses and deep breathing, which has found to alleviate heart pressure and stress.
Researchers wanted to see if yoga and aerobic exercise would have an effect on coronary risk factors of obese patients with type 2 diabetes.
The findings showed that aerobic exercise only and yoga only groups showed similar reductions in blood pressure, total cholesterol, triglycerides, LDL, weight and waist circumference.
However, the combined yoga and aerobic exercise group showed a two times greater reduction compared to the other groups.
They also showed significant improvement in left ventricular ejection fraction, diastolic function and exercise capacity.
‘Combined Indian yoga and aerobic exercise reduce mental, physical and vascular stress and can lead to decreased cardiovascular mortality and morbidity,’ said co-authors Dr Sonal Tanwar, a scholar in preventative cardiology, and Dr Naresh Sen, a consultant cardiologist, both with HG SMS Hospital.
‘Heart disease patients could benefit from learning Indian yoga and making it a routine part of daily life.’