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Editorial
Leveraging passive exercise to support brain health
  1. Benjamin Tari1,
  2. Matthew Heath2,
  3. Fabian Herold3,
  4. Boris Cheval4,5,
  5. Flaminia Ronca6,
  6. Jennifer L Etnier7,
  7. Joseph T Costello8,
  8. Nicole E Logan9,
  9. Megan Cully10,
  10. Liye Zou11
  1. 1 Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
  2. 2 School of Kinesiology, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada
  3. 3 Research Group Degenerative and Chronic Diseases, Movement, Faculty of Health Sciences Brandenburg, University of Potsdam, Potsdam, Germany
  4. 4 Department of Sport Sciences and Physical Education, École normale supérieure de Rennes, Bruz, France
  5. 5 VIPS2 Laboratory, University of Rennes 2, Rennes, France
  6. 6 The Institute of Sport, Exercise and Health, Division of Surgery and Interventional Sciences, Faculty of Medical Sciences, University College London, London, UK
  7. 7 Department of Kinesiology, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro, North Carolina, USA
  8. 8 School of Psychology, Sport and Health Sciences, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth, UK
  9. 9 Department of Kinesiology, Interdisciplinary Neuroscience Program, George & Anne Ryan Institute for Neuroscience, College of Health Sciences, University of Rhode Island, Kingston, New York, USA
  10. 10 Marker AG, Zug, Switzerland
  11. 11 Body-Brain-Mind Laboratory, School of Psychology, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, China
  1. Correspondence to Dr Liye Zou; liyezou123{at}gmail.com

https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2024-109129

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    Clinicians and practitioners have used passive exercise to improve mobility; however, research designed to systematically explore its effects is not well developed. This editorial will highlight evidence from studies of acute bouts of passive exercise that could be leveraged to understand whether regular passive exercise could maintain and improve brain health.

    What is passive exercise? the evidence for current use

    Regular active exercise (ie, volitional aerobic/resistance exercise) has numerous health benefits, including, but not limited to, improved functional abilities (eg, mobility), reduced risk of developing diseases, improved brain health and cognition, and facilitated recovery following a medical event (eg, acute injury).1 For example, active exercise can improve clinical recovery in individuals with a recent traumatic brain injury and reduce the risk of persistent post-concussive symptoms.2

    For individuals who are unable to actively exercise (eg, unconscious, paralysed or sedated patients, stroke or spinal cord injury, Parkinson’s disease), passive exercise is usually prescribed in settings such as in hospitals, rehabilitation clinics or care homes.3 Passive exercise is completed independently of an individual’s volitional effort and relies entirely on an external force to move an individual’s limbs. In this framework, passive exercise involves movement through a specified range of motion, often via therapist-assisted movement and/or via a mechanically driven flywheel or stationary tandem bicycle. In this context, the overarching goal of passive exercise is to maintain or improve mobility and prevent further musculoskeletal complications. However, the specific promotion of brain health via passive exercise prescription is often overlooked.

    Promising early research from Ridgel …

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    Footnotes

    • X @flaminiaronca, @joecostellophd, @nicole__logan, @megan_cully

    • Contributors BT and LZ conceptualised this research idea and drafted this manuscript. All authors have edited and provided feedback which shaped the manuscript. LZ is the guarantor and responsible for coordinating this manuscript with all authors and the journal.

    • Funding This study was supported by the Shenzhen Educational Research Funding (zdzb2014), the Shenzhen Science and Technology Innovation Commission (202307313000096), the Social Science Foundation from the China’s Ministry of Education (23YJA880093), the Post-Doctoral Fellowship (2022M711174) and the National Center for Mental Health (Z014).

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.