At a glance
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Rage Against the Pain: An Alternative Yoga Program to Address Chronic Low Back Pain Among Veterans
In Brief
A clinical study evaluating Rage Against the Pain (RAP) and Control for Chronic Low Back Pain. Completed, enrolled 36 participants across 1 site.
Detailed Summary
Chronic low back pain is a leading cause of disability among Veterans. Yoga is recommended as a front-line treatment option for chronic low back pain and is available across the VA healthcare system; however, despite yoga being the most widely adopted of VHA's Complementary and Integrative Health (CIH) therapies, Veteran participation in yoga still remains limited. Although it can be effective in managing pain, individuals cannot reap the benefits of yoga if they are unwilling to adopt it. One potential barrier to adoption of yoga among Veterans may be their perceptions of yoga, which for some, encompass long-held but perhaps inaccurate beliefs of what the practice entails and how their participation will be viewed by others. The goal of this study was to develop and evaluate an alternative-to-yoga program intended to improve Veteran participation and by extension, outcomes among Veterans with chronic low back pain. Based on Veteran input, we called this yoga program Rage Against the Pain (RAP) 'High Intensity Stretching'.
Study Details
Timeline
Interventions
The sets of body positions used in the RAP program will mirror those used in the Hatha Yoga classes, but the RAP program will differ from this traditional yoga practice in a number of ways: (1) the classes will be set to rock/heavy metal music; (2) meditation will not be incorporated; (3) yoga terms will not be used to describe the body positions (rather, positions will be cued in plain descriptive English terms); (4) the culminating activity for the class will be called a 'cool down' (rather than the savasana exercise typically used in yoga practice).
The control group will comprise a program akin to Hatha yoga with chair modifications available to all Veterans who choose/need to use them.