Jonna Kjellberg is a physiotherapist and yoga teacher who leads media yoga courses as rehabilitation for cancer patients in Region Östergötland with the help of stimulus funds from the RCC. Patients can participate either physically on site at the RCC Southeast premises in Linköping, or participate digitally via link.
Mediyoga is a gentle and therapeutic form of yoga, designed for healthcare. It is very much about practising mindfulness and slowing down the stress system. It can be done on a chair or on a mat and all exercises can be adapted to your own ability.
On Tuesday 18 October, Jonna Kjellberg and Frida Forsberg, who is a process leader in cancer rehabilitation at Region Östergötland, participated in a national webinar where they talked about their experiences of offering yoga digitally in Region Östergötland.
- The benefits of being able to participate digitally are several. Firstly, patients can participate regardless of where they live, and secondly, patients with a low immune system, or others who are just having a bad day, can participate, says Jonna Kjellberg.
Each patient may participate 10 times, once a week. The groups are mixed with patients who have different cancer diagnoses. The patients who have attended the yoga so far are from the oncology, haematology and urology departments. There are plans to include patients from pulmonary medicine as well.
For some patient groups, digital presence is the only option
Jonna also runs a separate medial yoga course for patients in the haematology department who need to be completely isolated. Because of this, this course is only performed digitally, and is fully adapted to be performed seated.
One difficulty with the digital yoga has been to find a digital platform that meets IT security and privacy requirements and works well enough technically, so that participants do not risk being "kicked out" of the meeting in the middle of the session. Work is still ongoing to find the best solution.
- It's a bit harder to keep track of whether participants are doing the right thing when they participate digitally, and there's not quite the same sense of community. But it's an important complement," says Jonna Kjellberg.
The yoga activities for cancer patients in Region Österghötland are run as a project and will now be evaluated. The ambition is to be able to expand the concept to the entire south-eastern healthcare region in some form.
