Yoga for Patients With Epilepsy

Is Yoga Safe for Patients With Epilepsy?

To establish the safety and feasibility of having patients with epilepsy perform yoga.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Epilepsy
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Yoga

Detailed Description

Subjects will keep logs of seizure frequency prior to, during, and following training in a yoga regimen. Instruction in the yoga regimen will occur at BIDMC, and home practice following classroom instruction will occur as part of the study. Side effects, changes in seizure frequency, and quality of life assessments will be performed.

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 20
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• United States
  • Massachusetts
    • Boston, Massachusetts, United States, 02215
      • Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years to 64 years (Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No
• Genders Eligible for Study: Female

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

1. Must be able to give full informed consent.
2. Must have one or more of the following seizure types: simple partial, complex partial, or secondarily generalized.
3. Age 18-64.
4. Must have 4-20 during the baseline phase.
5. Must have medical clearance from their primary care giver sufficient to allow for participation in yoga exercises.
6. Must be stable enough to allow for all anticonvulsant levels to remain constant for the duration of the study.

Exclusion Criteria:

1. Having primary generalized epilepsy or atonic seizures.
2. Having a history of status epilepticus in the past two years.
3. Any medical problem that would preclude participation in a yoga class.
4. Nonepileptic or psychogenic seizures.
5. Pregnancy.

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Other
• Allocation: N/A
• Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

1

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Intervention; Subjects invited to participate in yoga practice.	Behavioral: Yoga

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Time Frame
Improvement in quality of life assessments.	3 months
Improvement in mood.	3 months

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Time Frame
Improvement in seizure control.	3 months

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Kaarkuzhali Krishanmurthy, MD, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start: October 1, 2003
• Primary Completion (Actual): October 1, 2008
• Study Completion (Actual): October 1, 2008

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: September 13, 2005
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: September 13, 2005
• First Posted (Estimate): September 16, 2005

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): March 13, 2017
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 9, 2017
• Last Verified: March 1, 2017

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: epilepsy, yoga
• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Brain Diseases; Central Nervous System Diseases; Nervous System Diseases; Epilepsy
• Other Study ID Numbers: 2003P000337

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: No
• IPD Plan Description: No plan to share as was not included in original protocol as approved by the IRB, so subject consent was not obtained.