Effect of Balasana on Pulmonary Function Tests among Healthy Medical Students

MBBS is one of the toughest courses in the world, where students are busy with studies throughout the course. They have less chances of relaxation. Asanas and pranayama are two limbs of ashtanga yoga of patanjali which help individual to integrate mind and body. Yoga helps to lower blood pressure, increase lung capacity, improve respiratory function and heart rate, boost circulation and muscle tone. Many medical colleges in world already introduced stress relieving program. In yoga there are a set of postures to do. If medical students are asked to do whole asanas it will be inconvenient for them to practice every day due to paucity of time. Present study focuses exclusively on one asana that can be incorporated in medical student's busy schedule. Balasana is a simple relaxation position. Combined with proper regulation of breath balasana is supposed to soothe the mind. This simple asana can be introduced in regular MBBS curriculum.

To study the effect of balasana on pulmonary function test among healthy medical students. To compare the effect of balasana among study and control groups

Study included 100 medical students, who were selected by volunteer participation and divided into study group (those who do only balasana) and control group (those who lead sedentary life without doing any asanas). Pulmonary function test was carried out, parameters like FEV₁, FVC, PEFR, FEF _25–75 were measured using HELIOS.

It was found that there is no significant improvement in parameters in pulmonary function test

Results of our study showed that balasana has no effect on pulmonary function tests.