Public release date: 28-Nov-2007
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. —In recent years, researchers at the University of Illinois have uncovered a host of reasons for people to remain physically active as they age, ranging from better brain function to improved immune responses.
Now a new U. of I. study points to yet another benefit: a link between moderate exercise and decreased inflammation of damaged skin tissue.
“The key point of the study is that moderate exercise sped up how fast wounds heal in old mice,” said researcher K. Todd Keylock, who noted that the improved healing response “may be the result of an exercise-induced anti-inflammatory response in the wound.”
While previous research conducted at Ohio State University demonstrated a correlation between wound healing response time and moderate exercise, that research did not reveal a physiological cause for the reaction.
“That’s the key part that our study adds – that the acceleration and healing were associated with decreased levels of inflammation,” Keylock said
“One of the proposed mechanisms whereby aging adds to delayed healing is that the aged have hyper-inflammatory response to wounding,” Woods said. “The thought is that the exaggerated inflammatory response slows the healing process. So, in essence, what happened here is that the exercise reduced the exaggerated inflammatory response.”
“Increasing blood flow during the time of exercise is one (possibility),” he said. “We’ve shown in the past that has an effect on how certain immune cells – such as macrophages, function. “And if exercise can help decrease the amount of inflammatory cytokines put out by macrophages, maybe that would help decrease the inflammation, and therefore, speed healing.”