‘Online meditation & yoga helped senior citizens stay fit during lockdown’

BHOPAL: Mental health and impact of mobile-assisted yoga-meditation helped geriatric population during Covid-19 lockdown, says a research published by AIIMS Bhopal.
The study gave deeper insight into the schools of thought which will be important in designing future interventions and yoga-meditation-based programs in the future, essentially for geriatric populations as it serves as a feasible simple measure for the same, state the authors of the research paper.
The research titled ‘Yoga as an escape from depreciating mental health due to Covid-19’ is a qualitative study analysing the factors associated with mental status based on the experiences of geriatric population's participation in an online programme during Covid-19 lockdown in India.
The research was conducted as a component of a mixed methods study. It involved assessment of the mental status of the geriatric population due to Covid-19 and lockdown in India. Individuals over the age of 60 at the time of reporting for Covid-19 vaccination were recruited. In this study, 30 individuals were selected for the interview. All the participants were requested to participate in a narrative interview to unearth, comprehend, and explain the possible effects of Covid, effects of the pandemic on mental health with focus on the geriatric population, their methods to tackle it, and based on their participation for intervention, their experiences, benefits and troubles and suggestions if any.
Dr Varun Malhotra, Dr Ananyan Sampath, Dr Danish Javed, Dr Rajay Bharshankar, Dr Shweta Mishra , Dr Vijender Singh, Dr Dibyanshu Singh, Dr Avani Kulkarni, Dr Namita Singh and Dr Rimjhim Rastogi of AIIMS Bhopal from Physiology, AYUSH and Psychiatry, Community and Family Medicine were involved.