The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : Yoga classes for antenatal women

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Wednesday, May 13, 2009
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Yoga classes for antenatal women

R. Vimal Kumar

Tirupur: To ensure delivery of healthy babies, the Department of Health has introduced an innovative scheme to give free yoga training to antenatal mothers at the District Headquarters hospital here under the National Rural Health Mission.

Training

The first training session, held at the Out-patient ward block on Tuesday, has been attended by 30 antenatal mothers. Classes will now on be held continously on the same premises every Wednesday from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m..

Health condition

Official sources told The Hindu that the yoga training for antenatal mothers, first of its kind to be launched in a government hospital (GH) in the state, was aimed at improving blood circulation, mental health of both the mother and the child, vitalize internal organs of the child in the foetus, and overall growth of the baby.

The yoga lessons and psychological counseling are being imparted by an expert team from Tirupur Manavalakkalai Mandram Trust (TMMT).

P.S. Gopal, director (education wing), TMMT, said that simple exercise regimen would be followed at the sessions in which pranayama (breathing exercise) and techniques to utilise the acupressure points in the body to improve blood circulation and to massage foot were taught.

Objective

“Counselling is aimed at teaching the pregnant women how to bring down anxiety, blood pressure and hypertension,” he added.

Each antenatal mother will have to take a set of four classes, spanning a total of eight hours, to get the optimum benefit of the project.

Cardiac ward

A senior health official said that the yoga project would be extended to in-patients at the cardiac ward in the hospital from the first week of June.

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