Effects of a Blended Indoor and Outdoor Physical Exercise Program on Depressive Symptoms in Hong Kong Older Adults

Summary

Depression is a mental health problem often occurring in the elderly. Performing physical exercise is a key element in decreasing depressive symptoms in older adults. Most studies investigating depression and physical exercise have focused on structured exercise comprise of one or two exercise components and based on the clinical patients associated with major depression. There is limited research combining multicomponent (aerobic+resistance+balance) in an exercise program and targeting non-clinical adults with depressive symptoms, with even less available for older adults.

More attention has been paid to the role of outdoor exercise on human health. Exercise in a natural environment may provide greater physiological and psychological benefits compared to indoor exercise. Findings demonstrated that green exercise provides double the beneficial effect on improving depression among adults. Although green exercise shows effects on the improvement of depression, recently a review has indicated that structured exercise programs in older adults with depressive symptoms were mainly conducted in the indoor environment. Compared with outdoor exercise which is easily influenced by the weather and with low access of available facilities, indoor exercise is more comfortable, quiet, and convenient to operate especially for older adults. Considering the high relevance between nature and mental health, the combination of indoor and outdoor exercise programs might be able to maximize intervention effectiveness while maintaining the benefits for each type of intervention.Therefore, more rigorous RCT studies in this field are needed, particularly for non-clinical older adults with depressive symptoms.

Conditions

• Depressive Symptoms

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Blended indoor and outdoor multicomponent structured exercise

Participants will receive a 16-week blended indoor and outdoor multicomponent structured exercise program, with 2 sessions per week (90 mins/session). Session 1/week will conduct in indoor setting, while session 2/week will conducted in outdoor setting (park). Each session will comprise 10-min warm-up, 30-min aerobic training, 20-min muscle strength, 20-min postural balance training, and 10-min cool-down.

BEHAVIORAL

Indoor-only multicomponent structured exercise

Participants will receive a 16-week indoor-only multicomponent structured exercise program, with 2 sessions per week (90 mins/session). Both two sessions will conducted in indoor setting. Each session will comprise 10-min warm-up, 30-min aerobic training, 20-min muscle strength, 20-min postural balance training, and 10-min cool-down.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• Hong Kong Baptist University

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Yanping Duan, P.hD · Hong Kong Baptist Univeristy; Department of Sport, Physical Education and Health

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

DOUBLE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

60 Years

Max Age

74 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

Yes

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2023-04-01

Primary Completion

2024-07-01

Completion

2024-11-03

Countries

• Hong Kong

Study Locations