Takakura, Shu, Oka, Takakazu, Sudo, Nobuyuki · BioPsychoSocial medicine · 2019 · DOI
This small study tested whether a gentle form of yoga (practiced lying down with adjustable resistance) could help ME/CFS patients feel less tired. Nine patients with ME/CFS who hadn't improved with standard treatment practiced this yoga for 3 months. Their fatigue scores improved significantly, and their blood showed changes in tiny molecules called microRNAs that may be related to how the yoga helped reduce their tiredness.
This study provides preliminary evidence that isometric yoga may work through biological mechanisms (microRNA regulation) rather than placebo alone, potentially opening new avenues for understanding mind-body therapy effects in ME/CFS. Identifying biomarkers associated with fatigue improvement could eventually help clinicians predict who benefits from this intervention and track objective measures of treatment response.
This study does not prove that the microRNA changes *cause* the fatigue improvement—the changes are correlated with improvement but causation cannot be established from this design. The very small sample size (9 patients) and absence of a control or sham-yoga comparison group means results may not generalize to the broader ME/CFS population and cannot rule out placebo effects or natural variation.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
The first block is for the primary paper and is the citation you should use in research work. The atlas-snapshot line only applies if you are specifically referring to this atlas’s reading of the paper on the date shown.
Primary citation
Takakura, Shu, Oka, Takakazu, & Sudo, Nobuyuki (2019). Changes in circulating microRNA after recumbent isometric yoga practice by patients with myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome: an explorative pilot study.. BioPsychoSocial medicine. https://doi.org/10.1186/s13030-019-0171-2
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-takakura-2019-changes-circulating,
author = {Takakura, Shu and Oka, Takakazu and Sudo, Nobuyuki},
title = {Changes in circulating microRNA after recumbent isometric yoga practice by patients with myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome: an explorative pilot study.},
journal = {BioPsychoSocial medicine},
year = {2019},
doi = {10.1186/s13030-019-0171-2},
note = {PubMed: 31827600},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/takakura-2019-changes-circulating},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-30. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/takakura-2019-changes-circulating
Contribute
Private, reviewed by a human. Not a public comment thread.