Currently we are continuing our pilot studies, comparing 6 patients who are doing yoga plus a CBT program which was started with Motivational Interviewing (MI), a specific behavioural technique to overcome ambivalence at the outset of a process of change. Patients are not given a pre-set out program, but a program is adapted to their needs and specific responses each week. Already patients who were previously not communicating are emailing each other, are searching the internet, designing alcohol questionnaires which have already had the effect of reducing alcohol consumption by the very process of challenging oneself with the amount of alcohol consumed. Improvement is noted without any further need to implement further strategies at this stage. The program has run for three weeks thus far, and it is already noticed that the CBT techniques, and the use of the group is overcoming the lack of improvement in social avoidance and even reduction in alcohol consumption, which were residual problems after the yoga group. This has provided information for similar type interventions in the yoga program, more handouts, feedback forms for the yoga group, and has caused a deeper engagement by the yoga group than before in their own improvement. It is only 3 weeks into a twelve week program, and it will be interesting to see if the yoga plus CBT group fare better than the CBT alone. Following this, it is planned to administer yoga alone with these newer techniques informed back from CBT and its methodology, to see if there is any difference.

It is important that a very detailed expensive fuller research study with controls is not initiated until the methodology is developed and tested in detail.