Yoga as a Complementary Therapy for Clinical Depression

Clinical depression is a common illness, with prevalence of current depressive symptoms in the general population of nearly 10% and lifetime diagnosis almost 16%. Yoga offers an attractive option for complementary therapy of depression. The purpose of this study was to examine research regarding the benefits of yoga for depression, to learn to what extent yoga is beneficial as a complementary therapy for this condition. The method used in this study was a systematic qualitative review of interventions obtained from MEDLINE, CINAHL, and ERIC databases. A total of 18 studies met the criteria. Some of the designs utilized by the interventions were pretest posttest, quasi-experimental and randomized controlled trials. It was found that majority of the interventions (17) were able to significantly reduce depressive symptoms in the patients under study. However, several methodological limitations were identified in the conduct of the intervention trials, which future interventions must consider.