Further Indications of the Medical Value of Exercise

On Thursday, August 19, 2010, The New York Times reported that a study published in The New England Journal of Medicine found that the ancient Chinese practice of tai chi may be an effective therapy against the chronic pain condition fibromyalgia. The study was based on a clinical trial at Tufts University Medical Center. Tai Chi combines slow exercises, breathing and meditation. See http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/19/health/19taichi.html?_r=1&ref=todayspaper

This is just the latest in a long string of reports and studies about the value of exercise in preventing disease and mitigating its effects. Last fall, the Washington Post carried a story about physicians nationwide writing “park prescriptions” to get their patients walking in nature to help prevent or mitigate a wide range of disorders from heart disease to attention deficit disorder. See http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/16/AR200911....

And, in a book I reviewed for The Futurist for May-June, 2009, Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain, Harvard psychiatrist Dr. John Ratey chronicles success in treating patients’ emotional and psychological disorders with exercise in conjunction with and instead of drugs.

Despite the overwhelming evidence of the health benefits of exercise and the need to devote some of our leisure time to it, many people either do not exercise enough or not at all in their leisure time. Yet, I have good reason for hoping that this situation is slowly changing for the better. Just as smoking once seen as fashionable is now just barely socially tolerated, I think exercise and fitness are becoming the norm for people of all ages and both sexes. The medical community sees the need and the benefit, and more and more popular literature like the pieces above keep publicizing the medical community’s now unanimous opinion.