Exercise--strength and aerobic--consistently has demonstrated across-the-board improvements in quality of life for MSers, but there's much more to this than a better QOL. While strength and core training can help with everything from better balance to less fatigue to improved muscle tone, new research suggests that cardiovascular exercise in particular may have an effect on the disease itself. Aerobically fit MSers tend to have less brain atrophy and fewer cognitive issues (one study saw a 50% improvement in memory!). Best of all, researchers have found regular exercise actually lowers fatigue.
In the past few years alone there have been dozens of exercise-related MS studies conducted. And they all point to one powerful conclusion: regular exercise is critical in our MS fight, and might even be essential as there are few to zero drugs that improve cognitive reserve, balance, strength, fatigue or walking ability. But don't take my word for it, read the research yourself. Below are the headlines of nearly 100 diverse studies covering everything from yoga to weight lifting to biking to kickboxing. To read the study abstracts, click here to read the articlesin our forum or click on any of the images. (Sorry, the headlines below are not individually linked. This is just a partial list.)
