Brazilian researchers have found that regular aerobic exercise may help improve respiratory symptoms and psychological distress in adult patients with asthma. Researchers evaluated the outcomes of an asthma program in 101 patients with asthma.
In the control group, 50 patients received educational programming and underwent breathing exercises; in the aerobic training group, 51 patients underwent additional aerobic training beyond educational programming and breathing exercises.
After 3 months, quality of life scores, asthma symptom-free days, and anxiety and depression levels improved only in the aerobic training group. Furthermore, there was a linear relationship between improvement in aerobic capacity and the days without asthma symptoms. The study is published in the August issue of Chest.
