Exercise and Diet Significantly Help Improve Depression

A recent study shows the importance of healthy diet and exercise when treating depression, aging and cognitive decline.

Researchers found that the experiences and choices individuals make throughout their daily life often impacts the brain and the overall quality of life for older individuals. Lifestyle changes to diet and exercise are also important for the aging population as non-drug, easy-to-follow interventions with few side effects make ideal potential therapies.

The findings regarding the study show the following, courtesy of a press release:

• As few as 12 consecutive days of exercise in aging rats helps preserve and improve movement function, an effect possibly caused by changes in dopamine. The results suggest that exercise could stave off or reverse the slowed movements that are hallmarks of age (Jennifer Arnold, abstract 334.02, see attached summary).
• Practices like yoga or meditation that increase mind/body awareness help people learn a brain-computer interface quicker. This finding may have implications for those who need brain-computer interfaces to function, such as people with paralysis (Bin He, PhD, abstract 16.06, see attached summary).
• Long-term exercise in aging rats improves memory function, as well as increases the number of blood vessels in the white matter of their brains - the tracts that carry information between different areas of the brain. Increased blood flow may explain why exercise can help preserve memory (Yong Tang, MD, PhD, abstract 236.09, see attached summary).
• Regular, supervised exercise helped young adults with depression overcome their symptoms in a pilot study. The results suggest that exercise could be an important treatment for depression in adolescents (Robin Callister, PhD, abstract 13.02, see attached summary).
• A low calorie diet starting in middle-age onward protected rats against the effects of aging on movement. The results suggest that dietary interventions can help preserve movement function in a manner similar to exercise (Michael Salvatore, PhD, abstract 334.17, see attached summary).

"We all know that keeping fit is critically important to a healthy lifestyle, from combating the effects of aging to boosting our mood," said press conference moderator Teresa Liu-Ambrose of the University of British Columbia, who is an expert on exercise and its role in healthy aging. "Today's results begin to show us not only how different types of exercise interventions can improve our lives, but how other types of lifestyle behaviors, from diet to meditative practice, can help us achieve wellness in our body and our brain as we age."

 More information regarding the study was presented at the annual meeting of the Society for Neuroscience.