healthbriefs
Tai Chi Can Turn Depression Around
A
recent study published in the online edition of The American Journal of Ge-
riatric Psychiatry reveals that more than 2 million people age 65 and older suffer from depression, including 50 percent of nursing home residents. In seeking an alternative to aggressive drug treatments, researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), turned to a gentle, westernized version of Tai chi, a 2,000-year-old Chinese martial art.
During the study, 112 adults age 60 or older that had been diagnosed with major depression were treated with a standard antidepressant drug for four weeks. The 73 adults that showed only partial improve- ment continued to receive the medication,
but were also assigned to 10 weeks of either Tai chi or health education classes. The group practicing Tai chi experienced greater improvement in their levels of de- pression, as well as an enhanced quality of life, better cognition and more overall energy than the non-practicing group. Dr. Helen Lavretsky, the study’s first author and a UCLA professor-in-residence
of psychiatry, says, “This study shows that adding a mind-body exercise like Tai chi, that is widely available in the community, can improve the outcomes of treat- ing depression in older adults that may also have other, coexisting medical condi- tions or cognitive impairment. With Tai chi, we may be able to treat these condi- tions without exposing them to additional medications.”
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Exercise Pinches Salt’s Effects S
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alt in the diet becomes less of a concern for indi- viduals that are physically active, according to a presentation at this year’s American Heart Association conference sessions on nutrition, physical activity and metabolism, and cardiovascular disease epidemiol- ogy and prevention. The scientists behind the study concluded that the more active people are, the less their blood pressure rises in response to the amount of salt in their food. Study participants comprised 1,906 Han Chinese
adults (average age, 38) in the Genetic Epidemiology Network of Salt Sensitivity project, designed to iden- tify genetic and environmental factors contributing to salt sensitivity.
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