Yoga for Children and Adolescents After Completing Cancer Treatment.


Author: Hooke MC1, Gilchrist L2, Foster L2, Langevin M2, Lee J3.

Affiliation: 1University of Minnesota School of Nursing, Minneapolis, MN, USA Children's Hospital and Clinics of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA hook0035@umn.edu. 2Children's Hospital and Clinics of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN, USA. 3University of Minnesota Children's Hospital, Minneapolis, MN, USA.
Conference/Journal: J Pediatr Oncol Nurs. 
Date published: 2015 Feb 2
Other:
  Word Count: 176  
    

Survivors of childhood cancer may experience persistent symptoms, including fatigue, sleep disturbance, and balance impairment. Yoga is a complementary therapy that improves fatigue, sleep, and quality of life in adult cancer survivors. Using a one group, repeated measures design, we evaluated the feasibility of a yoga program and assessed if cancer survivor participants ages 10 to 17 years (n = 13) had significantly less fatigue and anxiety, and better balance and sleep, after a 6-week yoga intervention compared with a 6-week pre-intervention wait period. Study recruitment was challenging with a 32% enrollment rate; yoga attendance was 90%. None of the scores for anxiety, fatigue, sleep, and balance had significant changes during the wait period. After the 6-week yoga program, children (n = 7) had a significant decrease in anxiety score (P = .04) while adolescent scores (n = 7) showed a decreasing trend (P = .10). Scores for fatigue, sleep, and balance remained stable post-intervention. Fatigue and balance scores were below norms for health children/adolescents while sleep and anxiety scores were similar to healthy peers.

© 2015 by Association of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology Nurses.

KEYWORDS:

pediatric cancer; survivorship; symptoms; yoga

PMID: 25643973