Abstract
Chair yoga is relatively gentle and easy-to-learn form of yoga and is well suited to older adults with oasteoarthritis (OA) who cannot participate in standing exercises. The purpose of this study was to determine whether chair yoga practice could be sustained during and three months after an 8-week chair yoga intervention for older adults with lower extremity OA. A two-arm randomized controlled trial was conducted with twice-weekly 45-minute sessions (16 sessions) of chair yoga or Health Educaiton Program (HEP; attentional control group). Pain, pain interference, balance, gait speed, fatigue, and functional ability were measured at baseline, during intervention (4 and 8 weeks) and post-intervention(1 and 3 months). Hierarchical Linear Modeling was conducted to measure changes across time within and between groups and measure sustainability of the effect of chair yoga compared to HEP from Week 9 to Week 21 (1 month and 3 month follow-ups). One hundred twelve participants completed the intervention and data collection; 106 completed at least 12 of 16 sessions (retention rate = 95%). There was no other statistically significant sustained effect of chair yoga at the 3-month post intervention for any other variables except pain interference (p = .012). In terms of compliance with home practice after the intervention, only less than 50% of the yoga participants continued yoga practice at home using the guide book. The findings of this study were that older adults do not enjoy doing these types of activities at home alone and prefer to do programs in groups with support from an instructor.