Doing yoga may help reduce frequency of seizures in people with epilepsy and lower their anxiety, a new study found. The practice may also improve patients’ overall quality of life by reducing the stigma they feel from having the disease, according to the research, published last week in the medical journal Neurology. “People with epilepsy often face stigma that can cause them to feel different than others due to their own health condition and that can have a significant impact on their quality of life,” study author Manjari Tripathi from All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in New Delhi said. “This stigma can affect a person’s life in many ways including treatment, emergency department visits and poor mental health,” Dr Tripathi explained. In the study, researchers assessed people with epilepsy with an average age of 30 in India. They measured stigma among participants based on their answers to questions such as: “Do you feel other people discriminate against you?” “Do you feel you cannot contribute anything in society?” and “Do you feel different from other people?” About 160 people who met the criteria for experiencing stigma were then identified. These patients had an average of one seizure per week and on average took at least two anti-seizure medications, researchers said. One set of patients were then randomly assigned to receive yoga therapy, which included exercises in loosening muscles, breathing, meditation and positive affirmations. Another set of patients received a sham therapy that mimicked the same exercises, but these participants were not given instructions on two key components of yoga – slow and synchronized breathing, and attention to the body movements and sensations. Both the groups received seven supervised group sessions of 45 to 60 minutes over three months. They were also asked to practice sessions at home at least five times a week for 30 minutes and track their seizures and yoga sessions in a journal. Participants were then followed for an additional three months after their first three months of therapy. People who did yoga were more than four times as likely to have their seizure frequency more than halved after six months than the people who did sham yoga, the study found. Compared to those who did the sham practice, participants who did yoga were more likely to reduce their perceived stigma of the disease, researchers say. People who did yoga were also over seven times more likely to no longer have seizures than those who did the sham practice, according to the study. Researchers also reported a significant decrease in anxiety symptoms among those who did yoga versus people who did not. “The intervention group showed significant improvement in symptoms of anxiety, cognitive impairment, mindfulness and quality of life relative to the control group at the end of follow-up period,” researchers wrote. “Yoga may not only help reduce stigma, but also improve quality of life and mindfulness. Plus, yoga can be easily prerecorded and shared with patients online using minimal resources and costs,” Dr Tripathi said. Citing the main limitation of the study, researchers said the participants self-reported their seizure frequency and they may not have remembered all the information accurately. However, they say the findings “elevate the need to consider alternative therapies and activities for people with epilepsy facing stigma”. Read More Jonnie Irwin says he ‘never thought’ he’d be alive to see his 50th birthday Billy Connolly shares health update on Parkinson’s disease: ‘Every day gets stranger’ What are the symptoms of Parkinson's disease and how can it be treated? Jonnie Irwin says he ‘never thought’ he’d be alive to see his 50th birthday Billy Connolly shares health update on Parkinson’s disease: ‘Every day gets stranger’ What are the symptoms of Parkinson's disease and how can it be treated?

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TV star Jonnie Irwin has admitted that he “never thought” he’d be alive to see his 50th birthday, which is next week. Irwin, 49, who is best known for presenting property TV shows A Place in the Sun and Escape to the Country, was diagnosed with terminal cancer in 2022. In January, Irwin threw an early 50th birthday party, ahead of the actual date next week, with a huge part with 170 friends and family. But in a new interview, the presenter has said he will be jetting off on holiday to Spain with his family for his actual birthday. “I never thought I’d be here,” Irwin told The Sun. “I’m really looking forward to some time with [wife] Jess and the boys.” Irwin shares three young sons with his wife, Jessica Holmes. He has been praised for his transparency about his condition, and his experiences with various cancer treatments. Since his diagnosis, Irwin has followed a strict diet and spends one to two hours a day in an O2Worx hyperbaric oxygen tent. Some studies have shown that flooding the body with oxygen does not promote tumour growth and has been linked to preventing cancer growth. In July this year, Irwin discussed his “really good” experience with palliative care, which focuses on improving the quality of life for anyone facing a life-threatening condition. Irwin said that he has been in palliative care since the day he received his terminal cancer diagnosis. He was first diagnosed with lung cancer in August 2020, but only publicly shared the news in November 2022 after the cancer spread to his brain. His hospice experience was a “delight”, Irwin said, challenging his initial perception that such facilities were “very much a boiling hot room full of people who looked frail and towards the end of their days”. In September, the presenter made his long-awaited return to TV when he hosted a new episode of Escape to the Country on BBC One. Looking back at his time in a hospice six months ago, Irwin said he was “on the cusp of death”. “Lying in the hospice, I thought I’d had it,” he told The Sun. ​​“But at my weakest point I thought, ‘This is it, this is the beginning of the end.’” ​​Irwin returned home and resumed his strict diet, drinking protein shakes and spending time in the oxygen tent to attempt to curb the growth of his cancer. “I won’t let cancer define me,” Irwin told the publication from his newly renovated home in Newcastle. “A friend of mine told me, ‘Your body achieves what your mind achieves’, and I want to live by that.” Read More Jonnie Irwin jokes he’s ‘whacked’ after attending The Streets gig in Newcastle Billy Connolly shares health update on Parkinson’s disease: ‘Every day gets stranger’ What are the symptoms of Parkinson's disease and how can it be treated? Billy Connolly shares health update on Parkinson’s disease: ‘Every day gets stranger’ What are the symptoms of Parkinson's disease and how can it be treated? Tracey Emin says she ‘totally accepted death’ following cancer diagnosis

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When Abby Misbin received an Etsy order for one of her handmade cowboy hats from someone claiming to be Beyoncé’s stylist, she thought it was a prank. Setting her reservations aside, in June 2022, Misbin sent off a one-of-a-kind Stetson adorned with more than 5,000 mirror discs, in the hopes that the order was genuine. Then there was silence. Eight months later, Beyoncé announced her Renaissance World Tour on Instagram. In the official poster, the “Break My Soul” superstar is seen mounted on Reneigh, her disco horse, wearing a glorious diamanté leotard, cascading blingy jewellery and… Misbin’s hat. Three hours later – after Misbin asked a mob of her friends to tag her business account, TrendingByAbby, in the comments – she was inundated with orders. “I was under the impression that I hadn’t seen the hat being worn because Beyoncé didn’t like it!” recalls Misbin down the line from Pennsylvania, six weeks on from the tour’s final concert in Kansas City. “I just imagined her saying, ‘I’m not wearing this.’” But Beyoncé did like the hat. And so did millions of fans who were desperate to emulate their idol’s style. Misbin’s sales soared from approximately two hats a week to 30. At the height of the tour, she would be working 12-to-15-hour days just to keep up with demand. Each night, she’d find tiny shards of glass in her hands after glueing thousands of individual mirror discs to dozens of hats. Misbin is just one of many Etsy sellers who earned small fortunes making unofficial merchandise for the Renaissance shows. Many of these small business owners spent the six-month duration of that tour at the singer’s whim – their day-to-day lives consumed by the various hues of silver that dominated the tour’s colour pallette – a nod to Beyoncé’s disco-themed album. But it’s been six weeks since the concerts came to an end and Beyoncé rode off into the darkness on Reneigh. The silver bubble has popped, leaving Misbin and her peers wondering: what now? Erin Fritts, the owner of North Carolina’s Everwind Creations whose holographic hand-fans also became a staple among the concert crowd, says she was at the “mercy of Beyoncé” during the tour. Between May and October, the singer would make specific demands of her fans – ones that Fritts, Misbin and other Etsy sellers had to be savvy about. For her birthday in September, for example, Beyoncé implored her devotees to dress like “shimmering human disco balls” – and so Fritts got to work. Firstly, she did research into what keywords were being searched on Etsy the most: “Renaissance”; “silver”; “hand-fan”. It made sense. After all, it was peak summertime and an arena full of boisterous fans was bound to get sweaty. Fritts also noticed that the main prop Beyoncé used in the tour routine for her hit song “Heated” was a sprawling hand-fan. The stars had aligned. During the course of the tour, Fritts saw orders for her fans shoot up from two a day to more than 30. At £26 each, there was a time when the fans were generating over £800 daily. “My Etsy sales just skyrocketed out of nowhere,” she says over the phone. In those peak months, Fritts pivoted from her day job in digital marketing to focus on her Etsy full-time. “I was working long hours, and sometimes my mum would help out.” She laughs, “I was at the mercy of Beyoncé. I had to listen to whatever dress codes she put on the internet because who knows what she’s going to tell her fans to wear next?” When the music stopped on 1 October, though, these Etsy sellers faced an unwelcome inevitable. “I was really worried about demand dropping off,” Fritts tells me. “I was like ‘No! Please add more tour days!’ I was definitely mourning the end of the tour. I miss just chatting with the Bey Hive.” Her orders fell back to three per day– five on a good day. “I often wonder… if she does go on that tour again – will she use hand-fans in songs and make it her thing again? It’s up in the air.” Anna Ferguson, the owner of the OneLoveOneAnna Etsy shop based in Atlanta, Georgia, has noticed a similar lull in the sales of her disco ball earrings in the aftermath of both the Renaissance tour and Taylor Swift’s similarly colossal Eras tour, which is currently on hiatus. In addition to online sales, Ferguson would regularly loiter in hotel lobbies near arenas to peddle her handmade jewellery to fans staying there. “In Atlanta, I walked around the hotel with a bag of my earrings and a sign and in five minutes I had made hundreds of dollars,” she says. The next weekend, Ferguson followed the tour to Nashville, where she made $2,000 in 24 hours. “The tours were really a game-changer for me in terms of sales. And I have just ridden on the crazy world tour coattails all of the way.” Now, Ferguson is trying to adapt to a post-tour world. “Sales trickle in, but it’s nothing like what I was seeing,” she says. “This weekend, I’m trading at a Tay-Gate party [unofficial concert parties run for Taylor Swift fans].” She is also holding out for the Renaissance tour movie, which releases on 1 December, as she hopes there will be another spike in Beyoncé-related purchases, like her disco ball earrings with Queen Bey’s face printed on them. “During the tour, I managed to accommodate everyone with their accessory emergencies – I just hope that happens again.” Misbin says that the tour’s end is bittersweet. “Business is not what it was,” she sighs. “I don’t have as many opportunities like that anymore, but I do feel really lucky to have had it in the first place.” At her peak, she was selling 30 hats a week. Now, if she sells 10, she considers it a success. The milliner has also noticed hundreds of dupes of her hat surfacing online with a cheaper price tag. “I’m lucky to still be working full-time but I’m noticing companies recreating it with varying quality,” she says. Misbin herself had been advised to start outsourcing to a factory when she was at her busiest, but she never wanted to compromise on the quality. “I wouldn’t feel right paying someone pennies to make what I make,” she tells me. ‘I can’t imagine someone getting paid less than me.” When Beyoncé’s Renaissance tour ended, ticket seller Live Nation said it made more than half a billion dollars ($579m) from 56 concerts performed to approximately 2.7 million fans. Some fans will have searched Amazon or fast-fashion sites to get their quick fix of silver, disco-inspired outfits, but many, hearteningly, turned to independent sellers. For now, Misbin says she is keeping her “finger on the pulse” for the next big thing. She hopes that with Christmas around the corner and the forthcoming Renaissance tour movie, her sales will soar again before the new year. “I don’t want to miss another thing. If I had closed down my store two years ago, then this would have never happened,” she says. “I’m not going to necessarily shut down if sales are slow – they’re pretty good now. I’m just trying to ride it out.” Read More Beyonce’s mom says her daughter is ‘really mean’ Met Gala officially announces its 2024 theme What does the 2024 Met Gala theme ‘Sleeping Beauties’ actually mean? Met Gala officially announces its 2024 theme What does the 2024 Met Gala theme ‘Sleeping Beauties’ actually mean? Why do people think Met Gala 2024 theme could be a dig at Kim Kardashian?

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