Purpose::
Osteosarcoma cancer is associated with mental disorders, including depression. Evidences have shown that exercise can reduce depressive symptoms in these patients. The aim of the present study was to investigate the effect of exercise rehabilitation combined with vitamin D consumption on the level of depression in people with osteosarcoma cancer after bone marrow stem cell transplantation.
Methodس:
27 people with a body mass index above 30 kg/m2, age 24.90±4.03 years, height 163.85±3.62 cm and weight 82.17±4.5 kg participated in the study. In this study, 27 women with osteosarcoma cancer were randomly assigned divided into four groups (exercise), (exercise-vitamin D), (exercise-placebo) and (control). The supplement group consumed 500 IU of vitamin D three days a week for 10 weeks. The data were analyzed using a paired t-test and one-way ANOVA.
Result:
The results showed that after ten sessions of rehabilitation exercises with vitamin D intake, the mean depression score in the exercise-vitamin D group decreased from 22.88±22.63 to 20.56±29.71, which was not significant (P=0.3). In the exercise group, the mean depression score decreased from 22.23±54.14 to 21.33±67.3, which was almost significant (P=0.05). The exercise-placebo group score increased from 22.66±1.75 to 21.26±12.21 (P=0.06) and the control group changed from 22.12±5.23 to 25.45±14.7 (P=0.06). In addition, the results of the analysis of covariance showed that ten sessions of rehabilitation exercises along with vitamin D intake among all groups caused a significant decrease in the mental state (P=0.05) of people with osteosarcoma cancer after bone marrow stem cell transplantation. A comparative study between the groups showed that the greatest reduction in depression was observed in the exercise-vitamin D group.
Conclusion:
The results of this study showed that the combination of pilates rehabilitation exercises and vitamin D supplementation may be effective in improving psychological status and reducing depressive symptoms in patients with osteosarcoma after stem cell transplantation. However, considering the limitation of the sample size and the non-significant results observed in some within-group comparisons, further studies with larger sample sizes are recommended.