At the end of the follow-up period, the researchers found a decrease in resting systolic and diastolic blood pressure, mean blood pressure and heart rate in both groups. But the yoga group benefited from a much greater improvement with, in particular, a drop in systolic blood pressure of 10 mmHg against 4 in the stretching alone group. Resting heart rate and cardiovascular risk at 10 years were also better in the yoga group.
Mechanism still unknown
“The precise mechanism underlying this positive effect is not fully understood,” the authors say. “This randomized pilot study suggests that its benefits are not simply attributable to stretching alone. Indeed, if yoga is largely composed of stretching exercises, other elements are also part of it, such as breathing or balance. Indeed, yoga is a discipline of the body and the spirit more than 4,000 years old which “consists of exercises of meditation and breathing, in combination with varied physical exercises”, specifies the Institute of Cardiology of Montreal.
Even if its exact functioning remains unknown, yoga is therefore indeed an “additional non-pharmacological therapeutic option for the reduction of cardiovascular risk and the management of blood pressure in hypertensive patients, within the framework of a program of ‘primary prevention exercises,’ concludes Dr. Poirier.
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