Good morning People!!


I recently saw a case of vertebral artery dissection in a youngish patient who was otherwise fit and well, with no family history or past medical history of note.The only identifiable precipitating factor in the history was that the patient was a keen practitioner of yoga.So, good people of the Nexus, should you be an enthusiast of yoga then please take care and try not to stress your necks too much as both the carotid and vertebral arteries are potentially at risk.


http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17290110

Was it one specific position he did that lead to the damage, or long term forcing of certain movements? Any idea what specific movements would be more dangerous?

This individual had practised yoga for some years and its those positions which hyper-extend the neck repeatedly (and probably too far) which I think were the cause in this case.I must admit my ignorance regarding the different types of yoga and the technical terms for the various postures.

I Have a hernia that I've had for years from doing an upside down posture on psychedelics.

Here's an excellent article on some of the major health risks of yoga.

From the article:



This sums it up. Yoga is not dangerous when yoga is practiced. Yoga is dangerous when it becomes a sport for type A personalities. When your ego say's, "Hey that old lady can do the splits then so can I"... that usually ends bad and even if it doesn't it is counter to the true aims of yoga which is union.

I myself have injured my knee trying to push to hard into poses. Now a day's I actually practice yoga....or I try to keep my concentration focused and steady the whole class. I'm not there to compete with others or myself. I push myself hard each day, but I do it without reference to what I did on day's prior.

I do push myself, but I know my limites. I'm not very flexible in some regions and if I push to hard I invariably get that dreaded sharp needle point pain.

So, I think the article is good advice, but a wheee bit on the negative side. There is really no debating if yoga is good for you...when done right. The question becomes how do we get American's to practice yoga...for real? This I don't know. I'm headed to a class in a few minutes and I'd be willing to bet you that I'm one of the few people in class that actually has a regular meditation practice...ironically I came to yoga backwards. I started with meditation, or what I thought was meditation, and then sort of worked backwards to hatha.

These day's I love Hot yoga. I know myself and my limites. I push right to the limit and I get a huge endorphin release just about every class. This release typically carries an after glow that lasts into the next day.

In fact headed out to yoga here in a few minutes.

Peace

Did this mystery person visit a chiro or DO recently?

I think one of the main problems is the inveterate perspective of "no pain, no gain" that has permeated exercise tradition for generations. People overdo it, based on their "ambition" to be hyperfit.

I'm sure someone of normal anatomy would REALLY have to overdo a yoga asana to risk tearing the vertebral artery--although it is one critical artery that seems especially susceptible to catastrophic injury.

If you do yoga and look like any of those people in the pictures (whether or not you can "make" the pose or not), major injury sounds about right.

I don't go to yoga studios. When I was 14, I took some classes, but became quickly disenchanted with the lack of spiritual interest/knowledge (I remember asking all the instructors what "chakras" were, and NOT A SINGLE PERSON THERE HAD ANY IDEA?!).

The last class I went to, some years ago, I attended for free, and it was in a trendy Moksha studio. The instructor was literally LIKE A DRILL SERGEANT, screaming the whole time, and people had to drape towels over the mats because it was SO hot they sweat SO much and became a major slipping risk.

Nothing about that seemed healthy to me at all.

But the real point is... even if you aren't flexible, yoga is not a fraking pony show. If you can't touch your toes, SO WHAT? It's about calming the mind, falling into the body, and finding that state of grace/peace where you can breathe deeply and peacefully. If you just hang out and breathe, even if your knees pop up, even if you can't touch your toes, WHATEVER, maybe one day it will happen naturally, and, for sure, the stress-reducing benefits/spiritual element will be there.

I did yoga today on the beach and it was awesome. All alone, at my own pace, while the seagulls attacked people eating hotdogs and my man ran around on a skimboard in freezing cold water.

Minx I often do it at home as well. At home I do a totally different kind of yoga. I hold poses much longer and I often times do more meditative postures.

I also feel lucky in that the lady that teaches sunday morning classes actually does get a little more spiritual and lights candles and usually either reads or talks a little philosophy at first. It's a nice yoga class, but still not the kind what you can do at home.

Bikram or Hot Yoga however is a whole other beast. It's builds stamina, will power, and literally sweets out an immense amount of toxins. It's actually really good for the body to sweat. Plus with the heat high the humidity raises as people sweat and this increases the cardio load which ends up giving you a very solid cardio workout. It's actually really hard to complete a class when you first start going. My goal the first class was to literally just stay in the room. I spent a good bit of the class laying on the ground feeling like I was dying. Nope it's not for everyone. I however have really grown to love it. It isn't a replacement for home practice for me, but it's an practice that I could never replicate at home.

The biggest downside to Hot Yoga is the potential for new comers to injure themselves because the heat lets you stretch well past your normal limit. I actually over did it myself and got a minor groin injury. If however you can treat it like a real hatha yoga class were the goal is to maintain awareness and focus the whole time it can be immensely beneficial IMHO. Though for sure it's not for everyone. Most people look at me like I have 2 heads when I describe Hot Yoga to them...

Peace

Agree with this, 100%. I do ashtanga yoga, that is a dynamic type of hatha yoga, at home. I've been doing a daily practice for 2 years now, and the greatest lesson I've learned was to respect my body, and never to overdo anything. Progress is rather slow, but it doesn't matter. I've never suffered any injuries, but I try to do a balanced practice, where breathing and focus is most important. Yoga is definitely not a race, but a calming and empowering discipline. If one is aware of this (and avoids yoga- drill instructors ) chances of injuries can be diminished significantly.

I'm not an enthusiast but I do small amounts of yoga to help with back problems(poor posture and lordosis). Yoga is the most natural way to allevite the pain. The only poses I do are the cat, cobra and child's pose. And I don't do it regularly or anything.

Could these poses be dangerous? I think I'm all right as long as I watch my neck on the cobra. Keep in mind I only do these 1-3 times a week, when my back is hurting.

I'm looking at Ashrams to decide which I will be staying at in India. I saw this on one website and thought to share it
http://vedniketan.tripod.com/id9.html

Here's a conversation with William Broad, a New York Times reporter who has just put out the book The Science of Yoga, regarding yoga, veterbral artery tears, and the simple asanas that may be related to it.

I met the most amazing woman at a yoga class who happened to be head over heels in love with dmt and psychedelics. My instructor would also crack jokes about lsd and stuff all the time

i haven't gone in years though. just don't see the point in paying for it anymore although it was a great time

when they eventually allow changayoga, sign me up

This is stupid, it´s like when people claim deadlifts will fuck your back up or that deep squats are bad for your knees.

Sure they can be if you do them with bad form or bad programaming, same goes for yoga apparently if you force a position that you can not maintain with good form you will get hurt, it´s a gimme...

@Shroomtroll, people go into a yoga classroom with a lot more trust than they would into spaces involving equipment or weights. There really is a popular understanding that because it's low impact, yoga is inherently safe. Just being a yoga teacher has dropped in it's value over the past decade or so, so many people switched to training instructors, and just pumping them out, often without discussing the known risks of yoga.

Even when high risk areas are known, like the artery running along the spine, it's extremely rare for studios to take it out of their routine use, or ever warn the classes so practitioners can be informed.

No one's saying don't do yoga, they're just trying to make it safer by correcting misconceptions.

It´s sad when stupid people (bad trainers) give good things a bad rep, same goes for most things that go cemmercial, it get´s watered down and in the end dies out.