Yoga
Healthcare Centres

Collaborations with Healthcare Centres

The collaborations with the Healthcare Centres include:
– Hatha yoga lessons for patients and upon request for medical/non-medical personnel;
– Informative sessions about the benefits of Yoga and Yoga Therapy for health;
– Monitoring and evaluation.

How does it work?
At first, the staff of the healthcare centre identifies the potential beneficiaries of Yoga. Then, YIH organises the classes and provides trained Yoga teacher and pedagogic support.

Moreover, we propose Yoga classes to the healthcare staff according to their availability. In this way, they can better understand the practice and foster well-being at work.

So far, we have been collaborating with six healthcare centres:

Yoga courses data (Sept 2020 - Juin 2023)

The following data is based on the yoga classes from September 2020 to Juin 2023 in five health centres (WGC De Brug, WGC De Vaart, Maison de Santé ATLAS, MPLP, Maison Médicale Étoile Santé ) that have been collaborating with us.

So far, we have reached a total of 253 beneficiaries aged between 45 and 65 years with co-morbidities such as: type 2 diabetes, hypertension, mild to moderate depression, mild to moderate anxiety, back pain and gastrointestinal problems.

The total number of participants, as well as the average number of participants per session, continue to increase, thanks to several factors:

the commitment of the professionals in the health centres who refer patients to the yoga course;
the positive effect of yoga on patients, who are hooked and return to the class every week (retention rate* 44%);
the group dynamic which is also driven by the WhatsApp group where we send reminders and videos of yoga practices.

Since September 2022, the healthcare centres have covered some or all of the costs of the classes. This is an important indicator, as it shows that healthcare staff acknowledge yoga as complementary care.

As mixed gender classes were a problem, some health centres decided to offer women-only classes. However, while in the first year no men attended the classes, we have now welcomed a total of 14 men.

*Retention rate is the percentage of people attending more than 6 sessions.

Action Plan 2020-2030

Our ten-year action plan aims to include all the health centres in Brussels that are part of the Fédérations des Maisons Médicales. This would allow us to be active throughout the Brussels region.

We have started our activities in three health centres and this year we have added two more. The objective for 2023 is to activate other health centres in Saint-Gilles, Forest, Ixelles and Schaerbeek.