Benefits, barriers and determinants of practicing yoga: A cross sectional study from Kathmandu, Nepal.

BACKGROUND

It has been widely believed that practicing yoga helps to improve individuals' mental and physical health. However, the proportion of people practicing yoga is not encouraging.

OBJECTIVE

This study investigates the determinants, motivations, benefits and barriers to practicing yoga.

MATERIAL AND METHODS

This study is based on a cross sectional survey of 875 individuals in a face-to-face interviews conducted from February to April 2019 in Kathmandu, Nepal. The interviews were conducted using a semi-structured questionnaire, and the statistical analysis of the collected data was done using SPSSV20.

RESULTS

We find that females, older people, people with access to health education and internet, associated with social organization, and receiving yoga-related training are more likely to practice yoga. Major reported benefits of yoga include improvement in body flexibility and balance, a decrease in the level of stress, improvement in the quality of life, body weight maintenance, and improvement in immunity power.

CONCLUSION

Given that most respondents have been benefited from practicing yoga, we recommend people to incorporate yoga into their daily routine.