Cathie Gandel

Before she enrolled in the nine-week study to see if Iyengar yoga could prevent falls by improving stability and balance, Maryann Brown wasn’t sure she’d do it for long. “I went kicking and screaming,” says the 65-year-old retired schoolteacher and West Philadelphia native.

But Brown stuck with the program run by researchers at the Temple University Gait Study Center. “During one session, I heard a ‘pop’ and thought I’ll never get off the floor,” Brown says. But she did, and she walked better and felt better than she had in years.

More than one-third of adults age 65 and older fall at least once each year. Falls are the most common cause of nonfatal injuries and hospital admissions for trauma among adults over 65. A study released in March by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that in just a three-month period in 2006, nearly 16 percent of all Americans over 65 fell at least once. Close to one-third of them—1.8 million people—sustained an injury so serious that they visited a doctor or had to restrict their activities for at least a day. “We learned from this survey just how wide-spread falls are,” says Judy Stevens, an epidemiologist with the CDC’s Injury Center. “This is a huge public health issue.”