Yoga Therapy and the Management of Type 2 Diabetes
Lenora Darlison is a yoga therapist and has been a diabetic since 2000. She has experienced associated symptoms and co-occurring conditions such as “hyperlipidaemia, hypothyroidism, effects of inflammation, low mood etc.”
Until 2015, “I was on four different drugs plus 2 shots of insulin a day to control my extremely high blood sugars.”
Yoga therapy, following a specific diet, and other therapies have helped her manage her conditions so that she is now free from all medication, including insulin.
This has led her to explore further the current research available on yoga therapy as an intervention in the management of type 2 diabetes.
Lenora has written an article for us where she looks at 3 research papers that produce positive outcomes for the management of this serious, increasingly prevalent, and expensive disease.
She explains that diabetes is “a complex group of metabolic disorders in which persistent high levels of blood glucose ultimately leads to heart disease, stroke, kidney failure, foot ulcers and damage to the eyes.”
Medications, including insulin, are used but the “cornerstone” of care is lifestyle management. Thus, providing a role and opportunity for yoga therapy intervention.
The benefits of yoga therapy, in supporting stress management by helping the autonomic nervous system work better, are major reasons why it might be effective in managing this disease and the associated symptoms and conditions.
The three research studies that Leonora looks at are:
1. ‘Yoga as a complementary therapy for patients with type 2 diabetes: Design and rationale of the HA1C study’. 8 (Thind et all)
2. ‘Yoga as a Therapeutic Intervention for the Management of Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus’. 9 (Mondal et all)
3. ‘Therapeutic Role of Yoga in Type 2 Diabetes’, (Raveendran et al)
Lenora explains the details of each study and lays out examples of some of the yoga practices that were used in the different trials.
“In all the studies above, the yoga groups showed significant decrease in the levels of blood glucose, stress, and BMI. There were also significant improvements in lipid indices, immunomodulation (changes in gene expression, cellular immunity, inflammatory response)”. “Significant decreases in blood pressure, diabetes secondary co-occurring symptoms such as sleep and mood disorders, and regulation of the nervous system and, importantly, reductions in medication use after the yoga programme (Jeter & McCall),” were also seen.
We are grateful to Lenora for preparing and sharing this article with us. We are aiming to publish 4 articles each year on the latest research into the benefits of Yoga Therapy and we would really like some help!
If you are willing to prepare and write an article on Research that is interesting to you, and that you feel would be of interest to our members, please contact admin@yogatherapyassociation.org