Yoga May Cut Complications With Radiation for Head, Neck Cancer

WEDNESDAY, Nov. 1, 2023 (HealthDay News) -- Participating in yoga may cut negative treatment-related complications in patients with head and neck cancer undergoing radiation, according to a study presented at the American Society of Clinical Oncology Quality Care Symposium, held from Oct. 27 to 28 in Boston.

Kathrin Milbury, Ph.D., from the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, and colleagues randomly assigned patients to yoga with their caregiver (34 patients), patient-only yoga (33 patients), or usual care (33 patients). The yoga intervention included 15 sessions, either in-person or via videoconference, with sessions happening in parallel with the patient’s radiotherapy schedule. Data on treatment-related complications were extracted from medical records.

The researchers found that yoga session attendance was high in both groups, with 88 percent of participants attending at least 10 sessions (13.1 sessions in the patient-caregiver group and 13.3 sessions in the patient-only group). For patient-reported physical function and nutrition intake, yoga was associated with a significant effect favoring the patient-caregiver group. Compared to the usual-care group, patients in both yoga groups had significantly fewer feeding tubes placed. There was a marginally significant effect for yoga reducing emergency department visits, but no significant effect for hospital admission.

"I believe the lack of significant group difference between the patient-only yoga and patient-caregiver yoga groups is related to the high session attendance in both yoga groups," Milbury said in a statement. "One of benefits of yoga is the immediate stress relief, and as such our participants experience the benefit early on in the program."

Financial ties to Agenus and PharmaCann were disclosed; one researcher is the author of The Principles and Practice of Yoga in Health Care.

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