Yoga

The Integrative Health and Wellbeing Program at NewYork-Presbyterian and Weill Cornell Medicine offers small yoga classes. Our classes focus on healing particular parts of the body. We also offer general yoga courses for all levels and sessions focused on meditation.

Led by clinically trained yoga instructors, we aim to support patients interested in improving their physical well-being. Our classes include:

• Chair yoga: This gentle form of yoga is great for older adults or people living with a physical disability. Chair yoga is a modified version of yoga in which participants are either seated or standing using a chair for support.
• Qigong: This is a form of meditation, associated with tai chi, that focuses on coordinated body posture, movement, and breathing.
• Tai chi: A form of martial arts often referred to as “the gentle way to fight,” tai chi is also a gentle way to relax. This class focuses on meditation and stretching. Each posture flows into the next without break, ensuring that your body is in constant motion.
• Yoga for the spine: this class focuses on yoga poses that improve mobility and decrease back pain.
• Yoga for those living with cancer: the healing power of yoga can help cancer patients and survivors manage their side effects and recovery. The course consists of gentle therapeutic poses geared towards cancer patients to bring relief to create a feeling of well-being. For those recovering from surgery, yoga can gently restore motion, flexibility, and balance. 

What Sets Us Apart

Ensuring your safety is an important part of our yoga studio, which is why we offer:

• Clinician-led courses. Experienced instructors who have medical backgrounds lead our yoga classes. They are familiar with human anatomy and can give detailed instructors to optimize your sessions and help prevent injuries.

• Condition-focused sessions. Our yoga classes are part of our research-based, holistic approach to patient care. That’s why we offer courses that promote healing before and after surgery, reduce stress, and relieve symptoms associated with a disease or its treatment. In addition to yoga sessions focused on particular body parts of conditions, we can also modify courses based on your specific health needs.

While yoga offers several health benefits, it can also lead to injury without proper guidance. According to U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission estimates, more than 7,000 yoga-related injuries required medical treatment in 2010, the last year data was available. Additional studies show the rate will likely continue to increase. That is why it is important to practice yoga at a studio with well-trained instructors.

Yoga's Health Benefits

Yoga has several potential health benefits. Practicing yoga can help individuals relieve lower back pain, manage stress and increase their flexibility and balance. Research has shown that yoga is also beneficial for: 

• Anxiety and depression
• Arthritis
• Asthma
• Cancer-related fatigue
• COPD
• Fall prevention
• GERD
• Heart disease and heart failure
• Hypertension
• Migraine
• Pregnancy
• PTSD

Sign up for a class online or contact us to learn more about the yoga services we offer.