A recent study out of Boston University School of Medicine (BUSM) provides evidence that yoga and breathing exercises can improve symptoms of depression and anxiety in both the short term -- with each session as well as cumulatively in the longer term, over three months.
Published online in the Journal of Psychiatric Practice, researchers worked with a group of 30 clinically depressed patients. They were randomly divided into two groups doing yoga and coherent breathing with the only difference being the number of instructional and home sessions in which each group participated. Over three months, the high-dose group (HDG) spent 123 hours in sessions while the low-dose group (LDG) spent 87 hours. Results showed that within a month, both groups' sleep quality significantly improved. Additionally, tranquility, positivity, physical exhaustion and symptoms of anxiety and depression significantly improved in both groups.
The approach of giving different time sessions was explained by researcher Chris Streeter, MD, associate professor of psychiatry at BUSM: "Think of it this way, we give medications in different doses in order to enact their effects on the body to varying degrees. Here, we explored the same concept, but used yoga. We call that a dosing study.”
In this case, those who did less yoga still received comparable benefits to those who did more suggesting that even a modest number of yoga sessions per week are effective for displacing depression.