Effect of tele yoga on burnout, mental health and immune markers of Health Care Workers involved in COVID-19 duty: a pilot randomized controlled trial

Covid-19 pandemic has affected a large segment of global population and brought significant overload on the health care systems across the nations. Health care workers (HCW) form the pillars of any health care system are involved in war mode in tackling this global crisis. Being the corona warriors, they are subjected to various mental health issues like stress, anxiety, depression, poor sleep quality, professional burnout, lower mindfulness and increase in the level of immune markers which may hamper their resistance soon. Hence, to address the health issues and provide support and care, this Teleyoga intervention is being planned, as Yoga is proved beneficial in mitigating the mental and physical health issues. Since, social distancing is an important preventive strategy for Covid-19, yoga will be delivered through virtual mode. In this pilot study 60 consenting HCW will be randomized into Teleyoga intervention group (30 HCWs) and control group (30 HCWs). The intervention group will receive Teleyoga intervention 5 days a week for 2 months. The burnout will be assessed using Stanford Professional fulfilment index, sleep quality by Pittsburg Sleep quality Index, mindfulness by Mindfulness attention awareness scale and depression, anxiety and stress by DASS scale. Blood samples will be collected for assessing, IL-6, TNF alpha, CD4+T lymphocytes and Serum cortisol. The measurements will be done at baseline and at the end of 2 months.