Chemotherapy induces a lot of physical and psychological stress upon a patient. Among the side effects seen in chemotherapy are fatigue, nausea, insomnia, anxiety, and immunosuppression. For these matters, yoga may be an assistant to fostering a patient’s healing.
Dr. Sai Vivek V, Consultant – Medical Oncology and Haemato-Oncology, Aster Whitefield Hospital, Bengaluru shares the role of yoga in managing chemotherapy side effects. Yoga is not an alternative to medicine but instead is an alternative to symptom management and to health improvement and living.
Gentle poses, pranayama, and meditation techniques are helpful for relief from stress, enhancing sleep, and improving circulation-all factors essential for healing promotion and adopting a quality life. Research states yoga decreases cortisol levels and relieves chemo-induced fatigue while helping the emotions to gain resilience in cancer patients. The more passive methods of breathing-given as Anulom Vilom and Nadi Shodhana-slow the nervous system, whereas the restorative poses tend to open the body for regaining strength and flexibility.
Yoga becomes a therapy that instills a feeling of agency into their body and mind in cases where the patients often feel powerless. Yoga practitioners report an increased appetitive behavior, stable moods, and diminished sensations of pain throughout their treatment cycles.
Yoga, nonetheless, will need to be approached individually, accommodated for each patient’s needs, energy levels and medical considerations, and it ideally should be performed under a trained instructor with sufficient knowledge around the cancer care landscape. When used correctly, yoga becomes a suitable adjunct therapy for the cancer patients to gain an alleviation of distress-through chemotherapy, physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
