The New York Times (8/1, O’Connor) “Well” blog reports, “For those with heart failure, exercise may help ease depression,” according to astudy published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Reuters (8/1, Pittman) reports that researchers followed about 2,300 heart failure patients, about half of whom were randomly assigned to participate in an in-home exercise program, in addition to receiving standard heart failure treatment. The remaining patients were assigned to receive only standard treatment.
MedPage Today (8/1, Neale) reports that the researchers found that “at both three and 12 months, patients who were exercising in addition to receiving usual care had modestly but significantly reduced depressive symptom scores compared with those who were receiving usual care alone.”
WebMD (8/1, Goodman) reports that additionally, “the exercisers were about 15% less likely to die or be hospitalized for heart failure compared with the group getting usual care.”
HeartWire (8/1, Stiles) reports that study author Dr James A Blumenthal “said for heartwire, the magnitude of benefit was tied to how much the patient exercised. ‘It didn’t require marathon training. It looks like about 90 minutes a week, or three 30-minute sessions, was really sufficient to reduce depressive symptoms.'”
Related Links:
— “Exercise May Ease Depression in Heart Failure Patients, “Anahad O’Connor, The New York Times, July 31, 2012.