Physical Exercise for the Management of Cognitive Symptoms in Parkinson’s Disease: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

Aim

To synthesize the evidence for using exercise in the management of cognitive symptoms in Parkinson’s disease (PD).

Methods

Systematic review and meta-analysis (random-effects model) following the PRISMA statement. We searched on PubMed, Cochrane Library, Scopus, Web of Science, Embase, and PEDro, from May to June 2023.

Results

Forty-seven papers were retrieved, and ten studies were included in the meta-analysis. A small-to-moderate effect (−0.40 [95% CI = −0.81, 0.00]) was found for general cognitive function favoring exercise (n = 157). A small effect (−0.30 [−0.58, −0.02]) was found for executive function, with a sub-group analysis showing a near-significant effect of aerobic exercise in comparison to non-exercise control (−0.39 [−0.80, 0.02]).

Conclusions

Evidence shows that exercise has an important effect in reducing general and executive cognitive symptoms in PD. The relevance of aerobic exercises, the statistical trends in subdomains, and the quality of the evidence are discussed in this paper.

Keywords:

• Physical exercise
• cognitive function
• Parkinson’s disease
• meta-analysis

Acknowledgements

This work is part of a research project supported by the graduate scholarship program of the Brazilian Federal Agency for Support and Evaluation of Graduate Education (CAPES)/Ministry of Education of Brazil (no grant apply).

Disclosure statement

The authors have no conflict of interest to report.

Author contributions

VC: conceptualization, design, searches, data extraction, analyses, data visualization, drafting and writing; AOBS: searches, data extraction, drafting and revision; TSSB: data extraction, analyses, manuscript revision; TFR: data extraction and manuscript revision; ACG: conceptualization, design, analyses, critical revision of the manuscript.

Data availability statement

All data produced from this review, including extracted data tables and spreadsheets, can be made available upon appropriate request to the corresponding author.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.