Could Yoga or Aerobic Exercise Improve Women’s Quality of Sleep?

A recent study conducted actigraph sleep measures in midlife women to determine if yoga or aerobic exercise produced evidence of improved sleep quality, but their findings did not show any statistically significant changes.

Their study contributes to the limited research on the influence of yoga and aerobic exercise on objective sleep outcomes for menopausal women.
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A total of 186 late transition and postmenopausal women aged 40-62 with hot flashes from the Menopause Strategies: Finding Lasting Answers for Symptoms and Health network were included in the study. Participants were randomly assigned to 12 weeks of yoga, supervised aerobic exercise, or their usual activity. Researchers used linear regression models to compare the mean and coefficient of variation (CV) of change in actigraph sleep measures for each intervention group.

Baseline total sleep time was 407.5 ± 56.7 min, and wake after sleep onset was 54.6 ± 21.8 min. The mean CV for wake after sleep onset was 37.7 ± 18.7, and the mean CV for the number of long awakenings more than 5 minutes was 81.5 ± 46.9.

At weeks 11 and 12, actigraphic sleep outcomes had small changes from baseline, but researchers did not find any differences between the groups. However, an exploratory analysis did show that women with a baseline Pittsburgh Sleep Quality above 8 had significantly reduced total sleep time CV after yoga compared to participants in the usual activity group.

“Although small effects on self-reported sleep quality were previously reported, the interventions had no statistically significant effects on actigraph measures, except for potentially improved sleep stability with yoga in women with poor self-reported sleep quality,” the researchers concluded.

—Melissa Weiss

Reference:

Buchanan DT, Landis CA, Guthrie KA, et al. Effects of yoga and aerobic exercise on actigraphic sleep parameters in menopausal women with hot flashes. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine 13(1): 11-18.