Daily walking > 10 min could improve mental health in people with historical cardiovascular disease or COPD: Scottish Health Survey, 2012

Abstract

Social participation tends to be reduced with an advancing age, in particular in women [ [1] Julien D. Gauvin L. Richard L. Kestens Y. Payette H. The role of social participation and walking in depression among older adults: results from the VoisiNuAge study. Can. J. Aging. 2013; 32: 1-12 Crossref PubMed Scopus (17) Google Scholar ]. Walking as a therapy for health in the population has been studied since the 1990s, and even mall or neighborhood walking as daily exercise might be beneficial, in particular for older adults with limited physical and/or mental function [ 2 Davison R.C. Grant S. Is walking sufficient exercise for health?. Sports Med. 1993; 16: 369-373 Crossref PubMed Scopus (32) Google Scholar , 3 Travis S.S. Duncan H.H. McAuley W.J. Mall walking. An effective mental health intervention for older adults. J. Psychosoc. Nurs. Ment. Health Serv. 1996; 34: 36-38 PubMed Google Scholar , 4 Prohaska T.R. Eisenstein A.R. Satariano W.A. Hunter R. Bayles C.M. Kurtovich E. Kealey M. Ivey S.L. Walking and the preservation of cognitive function in older populations. Gerontologist. 2009; 49: S86-S93 Crossref PubMed Scopus (51) Google Scholar ]. Among the healthy working populations, walking to assist with individual social adaptation could also help lessen depressive feelings [ [5] Ikenouchi-Sugita A. Yoshimura R. Sugita K. Hori H. Yamada K. Sakaue M. Nakamura J. The effects of a walking intervention on depressive feelings and social adaptation in healthy workers. J. UOEH. 2013; 35: 1-8 Crossref PubMed Scopus (7) Google Scholar ]. However, attention has been less paid to the protective effect of walking on individual mental health after disease occurrence in early or mid life. In this study, therefore, it was aimed to examine whether and how daily walking might improve individual mental health after having common health problems in a country-wide and population-based setting.