Effectiveness of yoga interventions on stress and anxiety levels of school teachers during COVID-19 era in Anand district, Gujarat

Background: During coronavirus outbreak, lockdown was implemented in India and online teaching was adopted as new teaching method. This shifting in teaching pattern may increase the burden on mental health of school teachers and cause various mental health issues. Therefore, this study was done to assess stress and anxiety levels of teachers and impact of yoga intervention on them. Methods: An interventional study was conducted with teachers of five English medium schools. Pre-test was done for the assessment of stress and anxiety by using Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) and Generalized Anxiety Disorder 7 (GAD-7) scale respectively. Yoga intervention was done virtually once a week for three months. Participants were asked to practice the yoga daily on their own. After three months, post-test was done using similar questionnaire. Results: A total of 136 teachers were enrolled in this study. On pre-test, moderate perceived stress was observed in 95 (69.9%) participants. 38 (27.9%) participants were having mild anxiety symptoms and 74 (54.5%) participants were having no anxiety symptoms. Pre PSS mean score was 17.28 (SD=5.90) and Post PSS mean score was 13.29 (SD=4.30). Pre GAD-7 mean score was 4.88 (SD=4.28) and Post GAD-7 mean score was 4.24 (SD=3.13). There were highly significant mean differences between pre-post comparison of PSS and GAD-7 (p<0.001). Conclusions: The study showed significant level of stress and anxiety among teachers. Yoga intervention of three months was effective in reducing stress and anxiety levels in teachers.