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New study indicates moderate exercise may protect against colds
A moderate exercise program may reduce the incidence of colds. A study
published in the November issue of The American Journal of Medicine,
led by researchers at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, found
that otherwise sedentary women who engaged in moderate exercise had
fewer colds over a one year period than a control group.
Subjects in a group of 115 overweight and obese, sedentary,
postmenopausal women were randomly assigned to either a moderate
exercise program (45 minutes per day, five days per week and comprised
of mostly brisk walking) or to a once-weekly 45 minute stretching
session. Both the exercisers and the stretchers filled out
questionnaires every 3 months on the number of episodes of allergies,
upper respiratory tract infections (colds and flu) and other
infections. Subjects were taught how to distinguish various forms of
infections and were followed for one year.
Over 12 months, the risk of colds decreased modestly in exercisers and
increased modestly in stretchers. In the final three months of the
study, the risk of colds in stretchers was more than 3-fold higher than
that of exercisers. More stretchers than exercisers had at least one
cold during the 12-month study period (48.4% vs 30.2%), and among women
reporting at least one cold, stretchers tended to report colds more
frequently than exercisers.
Senior author Cornelia M. Ulrich, PhD, of the Hutchinson Center,
writes, "Our trial is the first to report on the effects of a
year-long, moderate-intensity exercise training program on the
incidence of upper respiratory tract infections. Although we did not
find an effect overall on upper respiratory tract infections, our study
suggests that moderate-intensity training can reduce the risk of colds
in postmenopausal, nonsmoking, overweight or obese women. This finding
is of clinical relevance and adds a new facet to the growing literature
on the health benefits of moderate exercise."
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The study is "Moderate-Intensity Exercise Reduces the Incidence of
Colds Among Postmenopausal Women" by Jessica Chubak MBHL, Anne
McTiernan MD PhD, Bess Sorensen MS, Mark H. Wener MD, Yutaka Yasui PhD,
Mariebeth Velasquez BS, Brent Wood MD PhD, Kumar B. Rajan MS, Catherine
M. Wetmore MPH, John D. Potter MD PhD, and Cornelia M, Ulrich PhD, and
comes from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Cancer
Prevention Program, Seattle, Wash; University of Washington,
Departments of Epidemiology, Medicine, and Laboratory Medicine,
Seattle, Wash; University of Alberta, Department of Public Health
Sciences, Edmonton, Alberta; University of New Mexico, Department of
Psychiatry, Albuquerque, NM; University of Washington, Department of
Biostatistics, Seattle, Wash. It appears in The American Journal of
Medicine, Volume 119, Issue 11 (November 2006), published by Elsevier.
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