Yoga For Bone Health, Balance And Falls: What Mr Iyengar, The Yoga Doctors And The Research Say

Scared of a fall, or told your bones are thinning? You are not alone, and you are not stuck. The great yoga teachers and the medical doctors who worked with Mr BKS Iyengar point the same way: stand well, load the bones, and train your balance, a little at a time. This guide brings together what each of them says about yoga for bone health, balance problems, walking and falls, and what modern research has found. Last updated: 31 October 2026.

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Yoga for bone health and balance: the short answer

Is yoga good for osteoporosis, balance and falls? Yes. In a 2013 Sydney trial, 12 weeks of Iyengar yoga, taught by a certified Iyengar teacher, improved balance, walking speed and getting up from a chair. Those are the main risk factors for falls. Reviews of yoga in general found better balance, a faster walk and stronger legs in older people. And bone gets stronger where it is loaded: yoga’s standing poses and poses on the hands load the legs, hips, spine, wrists and arms from many directions.

One thing to keep in mind as you read: most trials tested “yoga” of many styles, taught by teachers with very different training. The trial that tested Iyengar yoga for falls risk, taught by a certified Iyengar teacher, found it helped clearly, and in our view well-taught Iyengar yoga is likely to go further than the average. Why the kind of yoga matters.

The bottom line: five key moves for bones and balance

1. Go to a yoga class at your level, two or three times a week. The Sydney trial used two classes a week for 12 weeks. More often is better.
2. Make standing poses the heart of it. Strong legs, flexibility and a steady mind are what keep you upright. Standing poses build all three, and they spread your weight through the four corners of each foot, as Geeta Iyengar taught.
3. Load your hands and arms too, and bend from the hips. In a fall, the hand and forearm hit first, so weight through the hands matters. With thin bones, bend forward from the hips with a long spine. Never round forward under load.
4. Add breath work (pranayama). It calms the mind and steadies attention, and a calm, attentive mind is a steadier one on its feet. Confidence grows, and fear of falling shrinks.
5. Start now. New to Flametree, or away 3 months or more? 2 free classes, then 10 at half price, in Darwin or LIVE online.

Iyengar yoga is the style we teach at Flametree. During the 20th century, Mr BKS Iyengar was the major person who codified traditional Indian yoga, through his seminal books and widespread teaching. He also pioneered the use of props, so poses can be adapted to almost any body. His style is sometimes called modern classical yoga. This guide is part of our encyclopaedia of yoga for health conditions.

This guide in short

• Mr BKS Iyengar: stand well, use props, and correct the body little by little, never by force.
• Geeta S Iyengar: after menopause, keep the hips and joints free and lengthen the bones; strength counts more than suppleness.
• Dr Timothy McCall: his list of conditions helped by yoga includes osteoporosis, balance problems, gait problems and a rounded upper back.
• Dr Loren Fishman: a whole book on yoga for osteoporosis, and ten years of reports from his own students.
• Dr Krishna Raman: yoga gives the older body shape and support; props give confidence.
• The research: 17 studies listed below, from a Sydney Iyengar trial to reviews of thousands of people.
• Take it further: a free ebook, Strong Bones, Steady Feet, and classes in Darwin and online.

“Density in bones is a virtue, but in brains it is a vice.”

What osteoporosis, balance problems and falls are

These conditions travel together, which is why we cover them in one guide.

• Osteoporosis: bones become thin and fragile, so they break more easily. Osteopenia is the stage before it, when bones are thinner than normal but not yet that thin.
• Balance problems: feeling unsteady, wobbly or dizzy, often worse in the dark or on uneven ground.
• Gait problems: changes in the way you walk, such as a slower, shorter or shuffling step.
• A rounded upper back (thoracic hyperkyphosis): the upper spine curves forward, sometimes called a dowager’s hump.

Put them together and you get falls. Falls are Australia’s biggest injury killer: 6,698 Australians died from falls in 2022-23, about five times the road toll of about 1,300 a year. After a broken hip, about 1 in 4 people die within a year. That is the threat. The good news is that the things that decide a fall can all be trained.

For men: bones and balance are your business too

Thin bones and falls are often talked about as a women’s problem. They are not. Men also lose bone and balance with age. Men start with more bone, but the loss still comes, as the chart below shows. Men are less likely to know it is happening, and men do far less yoga than women. The standing poses, weight on the hands and balance work in this guide suit men just as well. About a third of the people in Flametree’s classes are men, and Stuart McGill, yoga teacher, Flametree Yoga Darwin, is in the Tree Pose picture further down this page.

“In order to be independent in life in old age, the philosophy of body is essential.”

What Mr BKS Iyengar taught about bones, balance and older bodies

In short: stand well, use props so the older body can practise safely, and correct it little by little, never by force.

Yoga: The Path to Holistic Health, Mr Iyengar’s book on yoga for 72 health conditions, has no chapter of its own on osteoporosis or falls. But the threads run all through it, and through his teaching of older students.

• Bones thin with age, and after menopause. Geeta Iyengar’s section on menopause names the onset of osteoporosis as one of the concerns of that stage of life (p. 31). Old age, the book says, brings “brittle bones, low metabolism, poor circulation” (pp. 31 to 32).
• Props make it possible. He describes props as helping the elderly, the weak and the inflexible to practise safely (p. 12). A chair, a wall or a block lets you hold a pose long enough for it to work.
• Learn to stand. Tadasana (Mountain Pose) is the foundation for all the other poses. His claim: it counters the effects of ageing on the spine (pp. 68 to 69).
• Balance can be made easy enough. He recommends Ustrasana (Camel Pose, a kneeling backbend) for older students because the final balance is relatively easy (pp. 156 to 159).
• Little by little. In a talk on teaching older students, he told teachers not to use force but to “correct little by little”, and that their job “is how to make them enjoy life in old age”.

We do not publish his sequences. A sequence needs a teacher who can see your body and adapt each pose, which is what a class is for.

What Geeta Iyengar taught about bones after menopause

In short: bone loss after menopause shows first in the legs and hips, so keep the hips and joints free, lengthen the bones, and keep the spine from shortening.

Geeta S Iyengar, Mr Iyengar’s daughter and author of Yoga: A Gem for Women, taught women through every stage of life. She answered questions on menopause and osteoporosis while, as she told her students, she was going through menopause herself. Her teaching, in our words:

• Bone loss starts in the legs. In a women’s class in Sydney in 1996 she taught that the “calcium fall” of menopause shows first around the hip and legs, more on the outer thigh bone, because we stand on our legs all day and bear far less weight on our arms. Lying leg stretches with a belt, the leg straight up first, keep the hip joint free; arm work overhead looks after the shoulders.
• Strength, not suppleness. Her words: “Suppleness does not count. The organic strength counts.”
• Keep the spine from shortening. At a 1992 question session on menopause she described how the spine is compressed with age and can form a hump. During her own menopause she sat for pranayama against the wall, so her spine stayed lifted.
• Stiffness comes from not working. Her advice for osteoporosis after menopause: “Do standing asanas, lengthen the bones, and lubricate the joints.” She added inversions, backbends, rope work, and forward bends with a hollow, lifted back.
• Start where you are. For stiff women who had never done yoga, she began with standing poses at the wall and supported sitting poses, opening the groins gradually.

Her book sums up the spirit of it: “Yoga is a gift for old age.” See it explained, with more Iyengar quotes.

“The standing asanas can be practised by one and all irrespective of age and gender.”

What Dr Timothy McCall says

In short: his list of the health conditions yoga helps includes bones, balance and walking.

Dr McCall is a US medical doctor and yoga therapist, author of Yoga as Medicine and former medical editor of Yoga Journal. His June 2019 list of conditions helped by yoga includes osteoporosis (no. 69), balance problems (no. 10), gait problems (no. 36) and thoracic hyperkyphosis, a rounded upper back (no. 111). His list is the backbone of this encyclopaedia, because it is organised the way the research is organised. We will add his own words on each of these conditions as we gather them from his book.

“Restructuring muscles, bones, tissues, posture, and internal organs takes time.”

What Dr Loren Fishman says

In short: yoga is a way to put load on thin bones safely, and his students kept at it for years.

Dr Fishman is a New York rehabilitation physician on the Columbia University medical faculty, who spent a year in Pune with Mr Iyengar. With yoga teacher Ellen Saltonstall he wrote Yoga for Osteoporosis (Norton, 2010), a whole book on the subject.

• His students’ bone scans improved at the spine and thigh bone. In his 2016 report, 741 people started his short daily yoga routine, and 227 kept it up well. In that group, bone density rose at the spine and thigh bone, and there were no serious injuries from the yoga. This was a report on his own students, without a comparison group, so it is his claim rather than a trial result.
• Yoga and bone health go together. In his 2021 review, Yoga and Bone Health, he makes the case for yoga as a way to look after the skeleton, in his view.

“Nobody pays attention to the bottom of the feet.”

What Dr Krishna Raman says

In short: exercise is good for bone, and yoga’s special gift is shape: it gives the older body support and confidence.

Dr Raman is a Chennai physician who trained in yoga under Mr Iyengar. His question-and-answer book on yoga and medical science has a section on osteoporosis and the ageing spine. His views, in our words:

• Yoga’s gift is geometry. Research supports exercise for bone, and in his view yoga adds something more: the shapes of the poses, which work the spine and joints in ways other exercise does not.
• Pain can ease even if the curve stays. For a spine that has lost height or rounded with age, his claim is that pain can go even where the bony curve does not change.
• Bend, like a willow. He compares the older student to a willow that bends rather than an oak that snaps, and sees props as what gives older people confidence.
• A practice for every decade. He sets out how practice changes through each decade of life, rather than one routine for all.
• Dizziness and unsteadiness have their own entries in his book, as does a rounded upper back.

“Not to fall does not mean to balance.”

Other yoga voices on bones and balance

• Yoga earns five stars for strength, flexibility and balance in adults. Her tip: “props and alignment matter most”. Mary Flaherty, Does Yoga Work?, a careful review of the yoga research.
• Should you do yoga with osteoporosis? “Absolutely.” Fold from the hips, and length before depth: stand and sit tall first, and how far you bend comes second. Margaret Martin, a Canadian physiotherapist, in Yoga for Better Bones.
• Steady feet start with the four corners of the foot. Geeta Iyengar taught spreading the weight evenly through the four corners of each foot. With wide-legged standing poses and the Warrior poses, this builds the quick reflexes that catch a stumble.

What the research shows

In short: Iyengar yoga clearly improved the main risk factors for falls; yoga in general improved balance, walking and leg strength; and bone answers load. Most of these studies tested yoga in general, of many styles. The Iyengar yoga trials are listed on their own first. Why the difference matters.

Iyengar yoga studies

These trials tested Iyengar yoga specifically, with its props and adapted poses. The Sydney pilot was taught by a certified Iyengar teacher.

• Iyengar yoga improved balance, walking speed and getting up from a chair, the main risk factors for falls. Compared with a control group, the yoga group stood up from a chair 3.4 seconds faster, walked 4 metres half a second faster, and stood on one leg with eyes closed almost 2 seconds longer. People came to 20 of 24 classes on average, and there were no serious problems. Twice a week for 12 weeks. Tiedemann 2013, a Sydney trial of 54 people with an average age of 68. Read the study.
• Iyengar yoga gave better standing and moving balance than tai chi. Both programmes improved every measure; tai chi did better for knee strength and balance confidence. Zhu 2021, a trial of 48 people aged 60 and over, 16 weeks. Read the study.
• Gentle Iyengar yoga lengthened the stride and opened the front of the hip, and more home practice brought bigger gains. Twice a week for 8 weeks. DiBenedetto 2005, 19 people aged 62 to 83, measured before and after. Read the study.

Balance, walking and falls: yoga in general

• Yoga improved walking speed and lower-leg strength and stamina. Iyengar and chair-based yoga were the styles used most often. Loewenthal 2023, a review of 33 trials and 2,384 people aged 65 and over. Read the study. Note: this review pooled many styles. Whether yoga beats other active exercise was not settled; that was yoga in general, and Iyengar yoga has not yet been tested against exercise on its own. Why it matters.
• Almost every trial found better balance with yoga than with no programme, and yoga matched tai chi. Bajaj 2024, a review of 18 trials and 1,408 people, Iyengar yoga among the styles. Read the study.
• Yoga improved balance and physical mobility in people aged 60 and over. Youkhana 2016, a review of 6 trials and 307 people. Read the study.
• Mind-body exercise, yoga included, improved overall, moving and standing balance in frail older people. Chen 2026, a review of 10 trials. Read the study.
• Exercise programmes, tai chi and yoga among them, lowered fear of falling straight after the programme. Kumar 2016, a review of 30 trials and 2,878 people. Read the study.
• Yoga lowered fear of falling, improved balance and made the lower body a third more flexible. Postures and breathing, twice a week for 12 weeks. Schmid 2010, 14 people over 65 who were afraid of falling, measured before and after. Read the study.
• Two minutes of Tree Pose a day improved one-legged balance in women with osteoporosis. Added to their usual exercise, it beat exercise alone on single-leg standing at 6 weeks. Solakoglu 2022, a trial of 32 women. Read the study.

The falls results in the general reviews were mixed. They pooled many styles of yoga, taught by teachers with very different training. The 2025 SAGE trial is not listed here. Of the four teachers the trial named, no more than two held current Certified Iyengar Yoga Teacher credentials, and there was no record of which teacher taught which person. Why the kind of yoga matters.

Bone density and the spine

• Mind-body exercise raised bone density, and also improved sleep, anxiety, low mood and tiredness. Tai chi, yoga, Pilates, qigong and others were pooled. Xu 2024, a review of 11 trials and 1,005 women around and after menopause. Read the study.
• Mind-body exercise combined with strength work gave the most consistent bone gains at the spine and hip, and programmes of a year or more did best. Zhou 2026, a review of 74 trials and 5,331 women after menopause. Read the study.
• Bone density rose at the spine and thigh bone in students who kept up a daily yoga routine, with no serious injuries. Lu and Fishman 2016, a report on 741 people over up to 10 years, 227 of whom kept it up well. There was no comparison group. Read the study.
• Yoga three times a week lessened a rounded upper back. Greendale 2009, a UCLA trial of 118 people aged 60 and over, 24 weeks. Read the study.
• Older people scored 26% better on an everyday movement test, with shoulder blades less rounded forward, after 6 months of yoga. Wang 2012, 21 people from the UCLA trial, average age 75. Read the study.

One review of Pilates and yoga found little change in bone density (Fernandez-Rodriguez 2021). Those were mostly short programmes of yoga in general, not Iyengar yoga, with its long holds, standing poses and weight on the hands. No trial has yet tested a full Iyengar practice for bone density. Not yet studied is not the same as not working. Why the kind of yoga matters.

Meditation and mindfulness

This trial tested a mindfulness programme, not pranayama. Pranayama trains the same steady attention, through the breath.

• Mindfulness added to a falls class improved the way people walked. Hoang 2020, 22 people in retirement homes, 8 weeks. Read the study.

Breathing practice (pranayama)

No trial has yet tested pranayama on its own for bones or balance. One small trial combined poses, breathing and hand positions, and found a less rounded upper back and shoulders after 10 weeks (Momeni 2024, 42 women; read the study), though the breathing part cannot be separated out. Not yet studied is not the same as not working. The pranayama we teach (staircase, ocean, alternate nostril, humming and a gentle shining skull breath) is slow, nasal and taught step by step. Why the kind of breathing matters.

“Attention is sharpened with the demand to balance.”

How this comes together in a Flametree class

Everything above points the same way, and it is how we teach in Darwin and online.

• Standing poses first: they build the legs, load the hips and spine from many directions, and train balance, all at once.
• A wall or chair close by in every balance pose, so you can work hard without worrying about a wobble.
• Weight on the hands: poses such as Downward Facing Dog, built up gradually, load the wrists and arms.
• Length before depth: forward bends from the hips with a long spine, never rounded under load.
• Short holds, repeated: they suit bone, and they build confidence.
• Osteoporosis exercises with a purpose: every pose loads a bone, trains balance, or both.
• Classes adapted to the people in them. No one-size-fits-all. Tell your teacher about your bones or your balance, and the poses are changed for you. Our gentle yoga and restorative yoga classes suit a slower start, and our pranayama classes go further with the breath.

Our bones and balance ebook is written by Chris Lalor, Certified Senior Iyengar Yoga Teacher and certified Yoga Therapist.

Read more on bones, balance and falls

• Bones: Yoga for osteoporosis: stronger legs, steadier balance, safe poses; weight bearing exercises for osteoporosis; Wolff’s law: why bone builds where you load it; how to increase bone density after 50; what the LIFTMOR trial and a 95-year-old teacher show; osteopenia.
• A rounded upper back: dowager’s hump and upper back pain and a rounded upper back.
• Balance: yoga for balance; how to improve balance after 50; loss of balance; three simple balance tests; balance exercises you can do at home; Tree Pose.
• Legs, feet and getting up: sit to stand exercise; the sitting rising test; ankle strengthening exercises.
• Falls and older bodies: falls and yoga studies; does yoga cause falls?; yoga for seniors; balance classes for seniors in Darwin; chair yoga for seniors; exercise for over 60s.
• All our notes on balance, bones and strength.

Take it further

• Classes, in Darwin or LIVE online: new, or away 3 months or more? 2 free classes, then 10 at half price. Already practising yoga? See the non-beginner half price pass. See every class time.
• Retreats: a week of daily, adapted yoga in Bali. See the retreats.

Other conditions are in our encyclopaedia of yoga for health conditions.

Yoga for bone health and balance: questions people ask

What did Mr BKS Iyengar teach about bones and older bodies?

Mr Iyengar taught that old age brings brittle bones, and that props make yoga possible for the elderly, the weak and the stiff. He made Tadasana, standing well, the foundation of all the poses. In a talk on teaching older students, he told teachers to correct them little by little, never by force, and to help them enjoy life in old age.

Which doctors who worked with Mr Iyengar have written about osteoporosis?

Dr Loren Fishman, a Columbia University rehabilitation physician who studied with Mr Iyengar in Pune, co-wrote Yoga for Osteoporosis (2010) with Ellen Saltonstall and reported on his students’ bone scans over 10 years. Dr Timothy McCall lists osteoporosis, balance problems and gait problems among the conditions helped by yoga. Dr Krishna Raman covers osteoporosis and the ageing spine in his question-and-answer book.

What did the Sydney Iyengar yoga trial find?

In 2013, 54 people with an average age of 68 did Iyengar yoga twice a week for 12 weeks, taught by a certified Iyengar teacher. Compared with a control group, they stood up from a chair faster, walked faster, and balanced better, including on one leg with their eyes closed. These are the main risk factors for falls. There were no serious problems.

Why is a fall onto the hip so serious?

Because the neck of the thigh bone, just below the hip ball, is very thin on top, thinner than a credit card. A fall onto the side can break it, and after a broken hip about 1 in 4 people die within a year. Standing poses load this part of the bone, and strong legs and good balance make a fall less likely in the first place.

What is the difference between osteopenia and osteoporosis?

Both mean bones thinner than normal. Osteopenia is the milder stage, and osteoporosis is when bones are thin enough to break easily. In both, bone still answers load, so yoga’s standing poses and poses on the hands are worth doing, with forward bends done from the hips and a long spine.

Can yoga help a slow or shuffling walk?

Yes. A 2023 review of 33 trials in people aged 65 and over found yoga improved walking speed and lower-leg strength. In a small study, 8 weeks of gentle Iyengar yoga lengthened older people’s stride and opened the front of the hip. The Sydney Iyengar trial found people walked faster after 12 weeks.

Do breathing and meditation help balance?

They help the mind that does the balancing. A small trial that added mindfulness to a falls class found people walked better. No trial has yet tested pranayama on its own for balance, but steady breathing steadies attention, and balance needs attention. Every Flametree class ends in rest, and our pranayama classes go further.

Where can I do yoga for bone health and balance in Darwin or online?

Flametree Yoga Studio teaches Iyengar yoga at Woolner and Coolalinga in Darwin, and LIVE online across Australia, with walls, chairs, blocks and belts in every class. New, or away 3 months or more? You get 2 free classes, then 10 at half price.

Where this comes from: BKS Iyengar, Yoga: The Path to Holistic Health (Dorling Kindersley), pp. 12, 31 to 32, 68 to 69 and 156 to 159; his talk on teaching the elderly, from a compilation of Iyengar therapy notes. Geeta S Iyengar, Yoga: A Gem for Women; her women’s class at the Iyengar Yoga Convention, Sydney, 1996 (student study notes); and her menopause question session, Panchgani, 1992 (transcript in Yoga Vaani, 2002). Timothy McCall MD, Yoga as Medicine (Bantam), and his June 2019 list of health conditions helped by yoga. Loren Fishman MD and Ellen Saltonstall, Yoga for Osteoporosis (W. W. Norton, 2010), and Dr Fishman’s papers as linked. Krishna Raman MD, Yoga and Medical Science: FAQ. Mary Flaherty, Does Yoga Work?. Margaret Martin, Yoga for Better Bones. Chris Lalor, Strong Bones, Steady Feet (Flametree). Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, falls deaths 2022-23; BITRE road deaths; ANZHFR hip fracture data. Studies as linked above. Everything is summarised in our own words.

This page is general information, not medical advice. Flametree Yoga Studio, Darwin and LIVE online.