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The Association of Outdoor Walking Per Week with Mental Health and Costs of Psychotropic Drugs in Adults

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Abstract

Regular walking confers many physical health benefits, including a reduced risk of disease-specific and all-cause mortality and better physical fitness. However, less is known about its role in mental health. Thus, the aims of this study were to determine the associations of outdoor walking per week with costs of psychotropic drugs used and mental health in adults. 500 adults aged 18 to 64 years in Hangzhou (China) reported sex, age, the name of the psychotropic drugs used and their dosage, and outdoor walking during the past 7 days. The cost that a person spends on buying psychotropic drugs for a month was considered psychotropic drugs costs. Overall mental health was assessed using the Chinese Version of the 12-Item General Health Questionnaire. The levels of walking in participants taking psychotropic were significantly lower than participants who did not taking psychotropic (p = 0.002). There was a significant negative correlation between mental health scores and minutes of walking per week and a significant positive correlation between the number of psychotropic drugs used and walking per week (p < 0.05). However, no particular associations were found between costs of psychotropic drug used and walking per week. Outdoor walking is prospectively associated with better overall mental health in adults. Then, awareness should be raised about the possible positive effects of outdoor walking on the mental health of adults.

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Data Availability

The data used to support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon request.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Health Education, Hangzhou Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Hangzhou, China

    Meng Wang, Caixia Jiang, Yangmei Huang & Xiaoyan He

  2. Students’ Affairs Division, Hangzhou Medical College, Hangzhou, China

    Lamei Deng

Authors
  1. Meng Wang
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  2. Caixia Jiang
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  3. Yangmei Huang
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  4. Xiaoyan He
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  5. Lamei Deng
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Contributions

MW: designed the study, collected and analyzed data, wrote the manuscript. CJ: assisted with data analysis and manuscript preparation. The rest of authors: assisted with data collection and analysis, manuscript review. All authors have read and agreed to the all aspects of the work related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work.

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Correspondence to Caixia Jiang.

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The protocol was approved by the Medical Ethics Committee of the Hangzhou Centers for Disease Control (China). Considering that no intervention was given to the participants, written consent was not obtained from them to participate in the research. However, they were assured that the results of their questionnaire will remain confidential and will not be presented to a third person.

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Wang, M., Jiang, C., Huang, Y. et al. The Association of Outdoor Walking Per Week with Mental Health and Costs of Psychotropic Drugs in Adults. J Community Health 48, 136–140 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10900-022-01157-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10900-022-01157-6

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