Exercise and Yoga
(Adria Richards, photo remix: Yoga woman on exercise ball:
flickr_enthusiast_rocks_Nilmarie_Yoga-001,
flickr. CC: BY-SA 2.0. Downloaded on May 26, 2009.)
Most women who exercise prior to pregnancy wish to continue, both for physical fitness and well-being, and to control weight gain. Many women, however, are concerned about the effect on the fetus, and so limit their exercise.
Exercise participation has been associated with higher levels of coping and lower levels of depression (Orr et al., 2006).
The greatest pregnancy concerns are having premature or low birth weight newborns, but in a large urban study (Orr, 2006), the risks of low birth weight and preterm birth were not significantly different regardless of whether the women exercised either before or during pregnancy.
Duncombe et al., 2006, examined the effect of exercise intensity, duration and frequency of vigorous exercise and found no significant differences in birth weight or gestational age at birth between study groups.
Sometimes women are advised against exercise during pregnancy due to concern about maternal hyperthermia, which is implicated in neural tube defects. Larsson et al., 2005, found that core temperature does not increase significantly at maximum exercise (up to 70% of maximal heart rate) or after exercise.
Yoga: Reduces incidence of preterm birth and low birth weight. Fewer complications during pregnancy, including intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR) and pregnancy-induced hypertension, and better neonatal outcomes including higher birth weight and lower incidence of preterm labor (when compared with the same duration of walking exercise).