More isn’t always better—and that’s especially true when it comes to your workouts.
According to science, squeezing in 20 minutes of vigorous exercise can not only give you cardio benefits, but boost your immunity, too.
The 20-minute exercise
To some, a 20-minute workout may sound like more of a warmup, but a 2017 study published in Brain, Behaviour, and Immunity suggests otherwise.
Researchers found that as little as 20 minutes of exercise can have anti-inflammatory effects that boost your immune system. They specifically monitored the effects of one 20-minute session of moderate treadmill exercise, but senior author Suzi Hong, PhD, in the department of psychiatry and the department of family medicine and public health at UC San Diego School of Medicine, says, that fast walking appears to have similar effects.
In the study, 47 participants provided a blood sample before exercising, which consisted of walking on a treadmill for 20 minutes. They then provided a blood sample immediately after. The blood samples showed that the exercise caused a five per cent decrease in the number of immune cells producing a cytokine, or protein, called tumour necrosis factor—TNF.
Why is that important?
Exercise activates the sympathetic nervous system, a pathway that increases heart rate, blood pressure, and breathing rate. When this occurs, the hormones epinephrine and norepinephrine are released into the bloodstream and activate a cellular reaction that suppresses cytokines, including TNF.
TNF has qualities such as boosting immune responses and killing cancer cells, as well as pro-inflammatory properties.
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Why and how exercise can reduce inflammation
Previous research has already demonstrated that exercise can reduce inflammation, but the significance of this study is in the physiological explanations about why and how this happens, says Carmen Terzic, MD, PhD, chair of the physical medicine and rehabilitation department at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.
Moderate exercise has a number of other benefits, too. It helps control hypertension and diabetes, prevents Alzheimer’s, reduces anxiety and stress, and slows the aging process. Dr. Terzic says that people who engage in moderate exercise regularly can increase their lifespan by up to 10 years.
“Exercise is our best medicine for almost every single disease you can think of,” she says.
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