By John M. de Castro, Ph.D.
““If you or your relatives are trying to improve your memory or offset the risk for developing memory loss or dementia, a regular practice of yoga and meditation could be a simple, safe and low-cost solution to improving your brain fitness,” – Helen Lavretsky
About 12.5% of women in the U.S. develop invasive breast cancer over their lifetimes and every year about 40,000 women die. Indeed, more women in the U.S. die from breast cancer than from any other cancer, besides lung cancer. Breast cancer diagnosis, however, is not a death sentence. It is encouraging that the death rates have been decreasing for decades from improved detection and treatment of breast cancer. Five-year survival rates are now at around 95%.
Unfortunately, even after successful treatment residual physical, psychological, and cognitive problems still persist and most of these residual problems go untreated. So, safe and effective treatments for these residual symptoms in breast cancer survivors are needed. Mindfulness training in general has been shown to help with cancer recovery and help to alleviate many of the residual psychological symptoms and improve cognitive function. The mindfulness practice of Yoga has also been shown to be helpful with the residual symptoms. In today’s Research News article Yoga and Self-Reported Cognitive Problems in Breast Cancer Survivors: A Randomized Controlled Trial “.” See:
or see summary below or view the full text of the study at:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4405403/
Derry and colleagues investigate the effectiveness of yoga practice on relieving the residual cognitive symptoms of breast cancer survivors.
They recruited women who had completed breast cancer treatment from 2-months to 3 years previously and randomly assigned them to either a wait-list control condition or to receive a 12-week Hatha yoga training. They received training twice a week for 90 minutes. Yoga participants were encouraged to continue yoga practice after training but no further classes or instruction were provided. The participants were measured before and after the 12-week treatment and 3 months later for cognitive symptoms (forgetfulness, difficulty concentrating, and being easily distracted), depression, anxiety, sleep quality, fatigue, inflammation, and general activity.
They found that the yoga treatment produced a significant decrease in anxiety, depression, fatigue and inflammation and improved sleep quality. Importantly, they found that the yoga practice produced a significant reduction in cognitive complaints (forgetfulness, difficulty concentrating, and being easily distracted), in comparison to the wait-list group, 3 months after completion of training but not immediately after training. This improvement was still present and significant even after taking into consideration the improvements in psychological distress, fatigue, and sleep quality. Hence, Yoga practice improved the physical, psychological, and cognitive residual symptoms in breast cancer survivors.
These results are interesting and important. They suggest that yoga practice is a safe and effective treatment for the residual symptoms that remain after successful treatment for breast cancer. Yoga practice has been shown to have a wide array of positive benefits for healthy and unhealthy practitioners. The present study adds to the list of patients who are helped by practicing yoga. It should be noted that yoga is a gentle exercise and there was no comparison to other exercises. So, it cannot be determined if it was the exercise in general or yoga in particular that produces the benefits.
So, lessen cognitive problems following breast cancer with yoga.
“The breathing and meditative exercises aim at calming the mind and body and keeping distracting thoughts away while you focus on your body, posture or breath. Maybe these processes translate beyond yoga practice when you try to perform mental tasks or day-to-day activities. . . meditation and breathing exercises are known to reduce anxiety and stress, which in turn can improve scores on some cognitive tests,” – Neha Gothe.
CMCS – Center for Mindfulness and Contemplative Studies
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Study Summary
Derry, H. M., Jaremka, L. M., Bennett, J. M., Peng, J., Andridge, R., Shapiro, C., … Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K. (2015). Yoga and Self-Reported Cognitive Problems in Breast Cancer Survivors: A Randomized Controlled Trial. Psycho-Oncology, 24(8), 958–966. http://doi.org/10.1002/pon.3707
Abstract
Objectives: Cancer survivors often report cognitive problems. Furthermore, decreases in physical activity typically occur over the course of cancer treatment. Although physical activity benefits cognitive function in non-cancer populations, evidence linking physical activity to cognitive function in cancer survivors is limited. In our recent randomized controlled trial, breast cancer survivors who received a yoga intervention had lower fatigue and inflammation following the trial compared to a wait-list control group. This secondary analysis of the parent trial addressed yoga’s impact on cognitive complaints.
Methods: Post-treatment stage 0 – IIIA breast cancer survivors (N = 200) were randomized to a 12-week twice-weekly Hatha yoga intervention or a wait-list control group. Participants reported cognitive complaints using the Breast Cancer Prevention Trial (BCPT) Cognitive Problems scale at baseline, immediately post-intervention, and 3-month follow-up.
Results: Cognitive complaints did not differ significantly between groups immediately post-intervention (p = .250). However, at the 3-month follow-up, yoga participants’ BCPT Cognitive Problems scores were an average of 23% lower than wait-list participants’ scores (p = .003). These group differences in cognitive complaints remained after controlling for psychological distress, fatigue, and sleep quality. Consistent with the primary results, those who practiced yoga more frequently reported significantly fewer cognitive problems at the 3-month follow-up than those who practiced less frequently (p < 0.001).
Conclusions: These findings suggest that yoga can effectively reduce breast cancer survivors’ cognitive complaints, and prompt further research on mind-body and physical activity interventions for improving cancer-related cognitive problems.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4405403/