New research finds that a yoga class designed specifically for back pain can be as safe and effective as physical therapy in easing pain. At the end of three months, when the yoga classes were wrapping up, the percentage of yoga and PT participants still taking pain medication had dropped to about 50 percent. Saper says he chose to compare the effects of yoga with physical therapy because “PT is the most common referral that physicians make for patients with back pain. “Any single treatment approach is unlikely to prove helpful to all or even most patients,”

Study Finds Yoga Can Help Back Pain, But Keep It Gentle, With These Poses