Non-Obese Asthma Patients See Benefits from Diet, Exercise
Diet and exercise improves the quality of life for adult patients with asthma who are not obese, according to a recent study.
The findings were presented last week at the 2017 European Respiratory Society International Congress in Milan, Italy.
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The randomized control trial included 149 adult patients with asthma without obesity. Patients were randomly assigned to either a high protein/low glycemic index diet with at least 6 servings of fruit or vegetables a day, a high intensity interval training intervention completed 3 times per week, a combination of the diet and exercise interventions, or usual care (control group). All interventions lasted 8 weeks.
The researchers measured the level of asthma control (ACQ), asthma-related quality of life, forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1), airway hyperresponsiveness (AHR), and fractional exhaled nitric oxide (FeNO) before and after the interventions.
A total of 125 patients completed the trial and were included in the final analysis. The researchers found that patients in the diet and exercise intervention experienced a significant reduction in ACQ and a significant improvement in asthma-related quality of life compared with patients in the control group. However, there were no significant changes in FEV1, AHR, or FeNO within the groups.
“Eight weeks of combined exercise and diet improves asthma control in non-obese asthma patients, but does not affect objective measurements of airway pathophysiology,” the researchers concluded.
—Melissa Weiss
Reference:
Toennesen L, Meteran H, Hostrup M, et al. Exercise and diet improve asthma control in non-obese asthma patients - a randomised controlled trial. Presented at: European Respiratory Society International Congress 2017; September 9-13, 2017. Milan, Italy. Abstract OA4678.