A recent controlled study underscores the potential benefit of aerobic fitness training in reducing the symptom burden of asthma and improving the overall quality of life in people with this disorder.

Asthma symptoms can have strong negative effects on both physical and emotional well-being. Exercise has been previously associated with improved quality of life in patients with asthma and other chronic diseases, prompting researchers at the University of Sao Paolo School of Medicine to undertake a randomized trial evaluating the effect of aerobic exercise training in 101 patients with moderate or severe persistent asthma.

The patients, who had received pharmacologic asthma treatment for 6 months or more, and had been clinically stable for 30 days or more, were randomized to 3 months of aerobic training (twice weekly 30-minute sessions) or to a control group that got no formal aerobics training. Both groups participated in a 4-hour educational program and received training in yoga breathing.

The aerobics training group had significantly more symptom-free days (24 vs. 16 per month, p < 0.001) (level 2 [mid-level] evidence) compared with the control group. In addition, the aerobics group had significant improvements in anxiety and depression scores from baseline (p < 0.001); the control group did not. Aerobics training was also associated with improvement in total asthma-related quality of life scores as well as physical limitation, symptom frequency, and psychosocial subscores (p < 0.001).

The reduced symptom frequency and the improvements in quality of life were not related to improvements in pulmonary function testing, which did not change over the course of the trial. Rather, the clinical improvements were related to improvements in aerobic capacity alone (Mendes FA, et al. Chest 2010 Aug;138(2):331).

This article was adapted from the DynaMed Weekly Update – Volume 5, Issue 32. August 11, 2010. DynaMed, published by EBSCO Publishing (www.ebscohost.com) is a commercial-free clinical reference tool created by physicians for physicians and other health care professionals for use primarily at the ‘point-of-care.’ Offering clinically-organized summaries for more than 3,000 topics, DynaMed is updated daily and monitors an extensive collection of journals and evidence review sources (www.ebscohost.com/dynamed/sources.php). New evidence is integrated with existing content, and overall conclusions updated based on the best available evidence.

This article was adapted from the DynaMed Weekly Update – Volume 5, Issue 32. August 11, 2010. DynaMed, published by EBSCO Publishing (www.ebscohost.com) is a commercial-free clinical reference tool created by physicians for physicians and other health care professionals for use primarily at the ‘point-of-care.’ Offering clinically-organized summaries for more than 3,000 topics, DynaMed is updated daily and monitors an extensive collection of journals and evidence review sources (www.ebscohost.com/dynamed/sources.php). New evidence is integrated with existing content, and overall conclusions updated based on the best available evidence.