Abstract:
Fatigue is an important symptom found in postpartum period of primiparous mothers
and affects their changes in life and their quality of life. The objectives of this quasi-experimental
research with two group pretest-posttest design were to compare the effects of yoga exercise on
fatigue and quality of life of primiparous mothers. A sample was recruited at Postpartum
Obstetric Care at Nakhonphanom Hospital by inclusion criteria. There were 52 primiparous
mothers and divided into a control group (n= 26) and an experimental group (n= 26).
The experimental group received a program of yoga exercise with routine nursing care, whereas
the control group received only routine nursing care. Instruments included Personal and Obstetric
Questionnaire, the Modified Fatigue Symptom Checklist, and the 12-Item Short Form Survey.
Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, fishers exact test, independent t-test, and
dependent t-test.
The results found that after taking the intervention, the experimental group had
significantly lower mean scores of fatigue and higher mean scores of quality of life than before
taking the intervention (t
25=9.60, p< .001), t
25= -11.85, p< .001 respectively).Furthermore,
the experimental group had significantly lower mean scores of fatigue and higher mean scores of
quality of life than those in the control group (t
50=-11.16, p< .001, t
50=6.28, p< .001
respectively). From the research results, it was confirmed that yoga exercise could reduce
maternal fatigue and improve quality of life among postpartum mothers. Therefore, nurses and
health care providers should implement yoga exercise program as a guideline to deal with fatigue
and improve quality of life among postpartum mothers.