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Practicing yoga may significantly reduce prenatal depression

In pregnant women with significant depression, practicing yoga may be a useful approach to decrease prenatal depression symptoms, according to a recent study conducted at Brown University.

“This is really about trying to develop a wider range of options that suit women who are experiencing these kind of symptoms during pregnancy,” Cynthia Battle, PhD, associate professor of psychiatry and human behavior at the Alpert Medical School of Brown and a psychiatrist at Butler Hospital and Women & Infants Hospital, said in a press release. “What we don’t want to do is have people fall through the cracks.”

Cynthia Battle

In the open pilot trial, Battle and colleagues developed a 10-week prenatal yoga program for antenatal depression and a yoga instructors’ manual. They enrolled 34 pregnant women from the community who had symptoms of depression to take the yoga classes. In addition to practicing yoga and mindfulness at the classes, women were invited to continue these exercises at home. The researchers assessed the changes in the severity of the women’s depression from before to after the yoga. This was measured through the Quick Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology (QIDS) score, in which a trained rater evaluates the women’s responses across nine different criteria for depression, and through the EPDS score, which utilizes self-reporting.

The researchers found that on the QIDS score, the women on average went from scores indicative of moderate depression (10-15) to scores reflecting mild depression (5-10). Similar results were seen with the EPDS scores, which dropped from levels suggesting clinically significant depression (more than 10) to scores well below this range.

The researchers also found that the psychological benefits seen by the study participants were commensurate with the amount of prenatal yoga the women performed.

The participants also demonstrated significant changes in some aspects of mindfulness, a component of yoga that involves directing one’s attention to the present moment and is thought to be the mechanism through which yoga eases depression.

According to Battle, the practice of yoga may be a viable option for women who are hesitant to take antidepressant medications, and may not be comfortable with individual psychotherapy. Of the women in the study, only four sought additional help for their depression.

“What we feel like we’ve learned from this open pilot trial is that prenatal yoga really does appear to be an approach that is feasible to administer, acceptable to women and their healthcare providers, and potentially helpful to improve mood,” Battle said. “We found what we think are very encouraging results.”

Battle and co-researcher Lisa Uebelacker, PhD, have since achieved similar results in a small randomized, controlled trial on the subject. They are currently seeking funding for a larger study with investigators from Brown, Butler, Women & Infants, and Memorial Hospital in Pawtucket, to gather more conclusive results.

“This is not the definitive study where we can say that this is an efficacious frontline treatment, however it is a study suggesting that we know enough now to warrant the next, larger study,” Battle said in the release. “This is an important first step in trying to understand if this is a potentially viable treatment approach.”

Disclosure: Battle reports no relevant financial disclosures. Please see the full study for a list of all other authors’ relevant financial disclosures.