THURSDAY, June 11, 2015 (HealthDay News) — Aerobic workouts may help ease asthma, according to a study published online June 10 in Thorax.
Researchers led by Celso Carvalho, P.T., Ph.D., of the University of São Paulo School of Medicine in Brazil, looked at outcomes for 43 people, aged 20 to 59, with moderate to severe asthma. The patients were randomly selected to do 30-minute yoga breathing exercises twice a week, or the breathing exercises plus a 35-minute indoor treadmill session twice a week.
After three months, the researchers found that those in the treadmill group showed greater reductions in asthma severity and more improvement in their quality of life. Levels of interleukin 6 and monocyte chemoattractant protein 1 also fell for those involved in the more rigorous exercise.
“These results suggest that adding exercise as an adjunct therapy to pharmacological treatment could improve the main features of asthma,” the authors write.