Stay fit, stay safe, stay happy.
Antidepressant medication may not be the best thing to fight depression as regular exercise can be just as good for your mind! I think I need to go out and exercise more considering how good it is for both mind and body.
News Target has an article that explores how exercise is the best antidepressant.
But a recent placebo-controlled study conducted by James Blumenthal, professor of psychology at Duke University and published in the September issue of the journal Psychosomatic Medicine compared exercise to a common antidepressant medication in a group of individuals diagnosed with major depressive disorder, and found that exercise was as effective as the drug at alleviating symptoms of the disorder. In this study, 202 depressed adults were randomly assigned to one of four groups: one that received the antidepressant sertraline, one that worked out in a supervised group setting three times a week, one that worked out at home, or one that received a placebo pill. Sixteen weeks later, 47% of the group that took the antidepressant, 45% of the supervised exercise group, and 40% of those that exercised at home no longer met the criteria for major depression based on a standard measure of depression symptoms. Although the percent of improvement in the group that exercised on their own was less than that of those that exercised in a supervised group, and the percent improvement in the supervised exercise group was slightly less than that of the group that took the antidepressant, the differences between these three groups were not statistically significant. All groups improved a statistically significant amount over the placebo group, 31% of which no longer met the criteria for depression at the end of the study. This study provides powerful evidence that exercise may be a viable alternative to antidepressant medication in the treatment of major depressive disorder.
