SYSTEMATIC REVIEW article
Front. Neurol.
Sec. Neurorehabilitation
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fneur.2025.1499407
This article is part of the Research TopicShifting neuromuscular rehabilitation to improve human functioning in low-resource settingsView all articles
The effect of exercise intervention on amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: A systematic review and meta-analysis
Provisionally accepted
- 1Liaoning Normal University, Dalian, Liaoning Province, China
- 2Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai, China
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Quantitative evaluation of the effect of exercise intervention in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Methods: The CNKI, WOS, PubMed, and Scopus databases were searched by computer, and randomized controlled trials (RCTs) of exercise intervention in ALS were screened out according to the inclusion and exclusion criteria of the PICOS principle. Stata 12.0 software was used for statistical analysis. Results: A total of 12 RCTs including 430 participants were included. Meta-analysis results show that exercise intervention can significantly improve the overall function, walking test (WT) distance and maximum expiratory pressure (MEP) of ALS patients (P<0.05). However, exercise interventions did not show significant effects on fatigue, maximum inspiratory pressure (MIP), forced vital capacity (FVC), and peak expiratory flow (PEF) in ALS patients (P > 0.05). Subgroup analysis showed that resistance exercise is the most effective intervention for improving the function of ALS patients, while aerobic exercise is the most effective intervention for improving FVC in ALS patients. Conclusion: Exercise intervention in ALS has a positive effect, but due to the small number of included studies and possible heterogeneity, risk of bias and sensitivity issues, further research is needed.
Keywords: Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), physical function, respiratory function, Exercise, Meta-analysis
Received: 24 Sep 2024; Accepted: 15 Apr 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Hu, Feng, Zhang and Shi. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Peng Shi, Shanghai University of Sport, Shanghai, China
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