LEADER
Exercise for chronic disease
Benefits of exercise therapy for chronic diseases
Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Dr Kujala
Department of Health Sciences, University of Jyvaskyla, PO Box 35, Jyvaskyla, Finland; urho.kujala@sport.jyu.fi
Accepted 1 August 2005
Evidence on the benefits of exercise therapy for chronic diseases based on randomised controlled trials is accumulating
Keywords: chronic disease; exercise; randomised controlled trials; evidence
| The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below. |
Regular physical activity is one means of decreasing disability and increasing the number of independently living elderly people, as well as decreasing the costs of the healthcare system. On the basis of a recent review of the results of randomised controlled trials (RCTs), there is accumulating evidence that, in patients with chronic disease, exercise therapy is effective in increasing fitness and correcting some risk factors for the development of disease complications.1
Traditionally physical activity has been regarded as a powerful tool in the prevention of certain chronic diseases, even though this has been confirmed in only a very few cases by RCTs.2 When the strength of evidence for the use of exercise in health care is evaluated, data from epidemiological observational follow ups, studies on the mechanisms of disease, and controlled clinical trials are used. Observational follow up studies can be biased for many reasons, such
CiteULike 
Complore 
Connotea 
Del.icio.us 
Digg 
Reddit 
Technorati What's this?
- Full Text
- Full Text (PDF)
- Submit a response
- Alert me when this article is cited
- Alert me when eLetters are posted
- Alert me if a correction is posted
Services
- Email this link to a friend
- Similar articles in this journal
- Similar articles in PubMed
- Add article to my folders
- Download to citation manager
- Request Permissions
Citing Articles
Google Scholar
PubMed
Topic Collections
Bookmark with
Register for free content
The full back archive is now available for all BMJ Journals. Institutional subscribers may access the entire archive as part of their subscription. Personal subscribers will also have access to all content when logged in. Non-subscribers who register have free access to all articles published before 2006 right back to volume 1 issue 1. Register here to access the free archive of all BMJ Journals.
Don't forget to sign up for content alerts so you keep up to date with all the articles as they are published.
