Physical exercise naturally treats psychiatric patients: Study

New Delhi, May 27 (ANI): A new study has recommended physical exercise as a natural way to treat patients with mental health and mood disorders - from anxiety and depression to schizophrenia, suicidality and acute psychotic episodes. "The general attitude of medicine is that you treat the primary problem first, and exercise was never considered to be a life or death treatment option. Now that we know it's so effective, it can become as fundamental as pharmacological intervention," explained David Tomasi, a psychotherapist and inpatient psychiatry group therapist at the University of Vermont Medical Center and the lead researcher of the study. Practitioners at inpatient psychiatric facilities - often crowded, acute settings in which patients experience severe distress and discomfort - typically prescribe psychotropic medications first, rather than natural remedies like physical exercise, to alleviate patients' symptoms such as anger, anxiety and depression. In fact, Tomasi estimated tha