EFFECT OF YOGA ON PSYCHO PHYSICAL FUNCTIONING OF NURSING STUDENTS RANDOMIZED WAIT LIST CONTROLLED STUDY

Abstract

Nursing students experience considerable amount of stress to meet their rofessional demands both academic and clinical requirements. However, yoga is an effective practice to reduce stress and improve psychological and physical well-being. To evaluate the effectiveness of an 8-week yoga intervention on psycho-physical functioning of nursing students.This was a randomized wait-list control trial. We recruited 100 students from Kempegowda Institute of Nursing, Bangalore and randomized them into two groups (yoga=50 and wait-list control=50 students). The following instruments were used to collect the data, Freiburg newlineMindfulness Inventory (FMI), Self-Compassion Scale- short form (SCS-SF), Connor Davidson Resilience Scale (CD-RISC), Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS), Jefferson Scale of Empathy HPS-Version (JSE-HPS), Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), Sit and Reach Test, Peak Flow Meter, Handgrip Dynamometer, Pinch Gauge and Purdue Pegboard. Data was analyzed newlineusing Repeated Measures Analysis of Variance (RM-ANOVA) followed by post-hoc newlineBonferroni correction for all the variables.Our study findings have revealed that an 8-week yoga intervention significantly improved mindfulness (p=.005), self-compassion (p=.016), low back and hamstring flexibility (plt.001), newlinepinch strength chunk (p=.013), and pulp (p=.024) among nursing students in the yoga group than compared to the wait-list control (WLC) group. Also, there was a significant improvement in peak expiratory flow rate (plt.001) in both the groups. And, in hand dexterity sub-scales there were significant improvements; right hand both the groups (p=.006), left hand yoga group (p=.006), WLC group (p=.001), and in assembly test yoga group (p=.009) and the WLC group (p=.027) respectively. Even though, our results were non-significant the following improvements were witnessed among participants of the yoga group in contrast to the WLC group. There were improvements in resilience and perceived stress in the yoga group but not in WLC group.