Despite methodological drawbacks of the included studies, yoga could be considered an ancillary treatment option for patients with depressive disorders and individuals with elevated levels of depression.

Moderate-quality evidence supports the recommendation of yoga as a supportive intervention for improving health-related quality of life and reducing fatigue and sleep disturbances when compared with no therapy, as well as for reducing depression, anxiety and fatigue, when compared with psychosocial/educational interventions. Very low-quality evidence suggests that yoga might be as effective as other exercise interventions and might be used as an alternative to other exercise programmes.

This systematic review found strong evidence for short-term effectiveness and moderate evidence for long-term effectiveness of yoga for chronic low back pain in the most important patient-centered outcomes. Yoga can be recommended as an additional therapy to chronic low back pain patients.

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This randomized trial found no effects of yoga on health-related quality of life in patients with colorectal cancer. Given the high attrition rate and low intervention adherence, no definite conclusions can be drawn from this trial.

The statistical heterogeneity of the included studies is very high. Somatoform disorders and medically unexplained symptoms are more common than generally assumed. The found prevalences highlight the importance of these conditions in primary care.

BackgroundTo review the prevalence and impact of generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) below the diagnostic threshold and explore its treatment needs in times of scarce healthcare resources.MethodsA systematic literature search was conducted until January 2013 using PUBMED/MEDLINE, PSYCINFO, EMBASE and reference lists to identify epidemiological studies of subthreshold GAD, i.e. GAD symptoms that do not reach the current thresholds of DSM-III-R, DSM-IV or ICD-10. Quality of all included studies was assessed and median prevalences of subthreshold GAD were calculated for different subpopulations.ResultsInclusion criteria led to 15 high-quality and 3 low-quality epidemiological studies with a total of 48,214 participants being reviewed. Whilst GAD proved to be a common mental health disorder, the prevalence for subthreshold GAD was twice that for the full syndrome. Subthreshold GAD is typically persistent, causing considerably more suffering and impairment in psychosocial and work functioning, benzodiazepine and primary health care use, than in non-anxious individuals. Subthreshold GAD can also increase the risk of onset and worsen the course of a range of comorbid mental health, pain and somatic disorders; further increasing costs. Results are robust against bias due to low study quality.ConclusionsSubthreshold GAD is a common, recurrent and impairing disease with verifiable morbidity that claims significant healthcare resources. As such, it should receive additional research and clinical attention.