Introduction: Osteoporosis is the most common metabolic bone disease that is known with alteration and destruction of skeletal structure and increase in fracture risk. This study was done to compare lumbar spine bone density in non-athletic and athletic (yoga and walking) postmenopausal women.
Methods: The study was a causal-comparative research and applied after the fact that was conducted in Kosar densitometry center, Mashhad, Iran in 2013 on 33 postmenopausal women aged 48-64 years. Participants were divided into three groups: yoga, walking and non-athletes. Athletic women had physical activity at least 5 years experience in yoga and walking,  regularly three times per week and one hour for each session and non-athletic women did not experience any physical activity. Bone mineral density of the lumbar spine were measured and compared by Dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DEXA). Data were analyzed using SPSS software version 16 and ANOVA, Tukey, Shapiro-Wilk was done. P value less than 0.05 was considered significant.
Results: The mineral density of the lumbar spine in postmenopausal athletic women was significantly higher than non-athletic counterparts (p=0.012). Comparisons between groups showed that walking group had the highest amount of mineral density of the lumbar spine compared to yoga and control group and yoga group showed higher amount of mineral density compared to the control group.
Conclusion: Postmenopausal women's sports programs such as yoga and walking can increase bone mineral density of the lumbar spine and could be use as an effective non-pharmacological methods of preventing bone mineral density loss.