En metaanalyse av trening som intervensjon for depresjon

Depression will be the second leading cause of global burden of disease in 2020 according to WHO estimates. Although well- documented treatment interventions for depression exist, not all patients achieve satisfactory remission. This implies a need for alternative interventions. Exercise as a treatment for depression has previously shown promising results, and the objective of this meta- analysis is to consider the effectiveness of exercise as an intervention for depression by pooling data from randomized controlled trials. The meta-analysis is an update to the previous meta-analysis Exercise for depression" by Rimer et al. (2012) published by Cochrane. Furthermore, we investigated three domains not previously assessed in recent published meta- analyses. We searched PsycInfo, Embase, Medline, Central and Sports Discus from January 2007/2010 to October 2013 for new relevant articles. A total of 32 studies were included in the meta- analysis. The results indicate that exercise is an effective intervention for depression, and that this effect is also evident in follow up studies. However, the effect sizes decreased as the method applied becomes more stringent. Furthermore, exercise shows promise as an add-on treatment in combination with antidepressants, but this needs further investigation to be verified, as the number of studies in this analysis was small