Investigating the Effect of Pilates Training and Vitamin D Supplementation on Quality of Life and Mental Health of Overweight Men

Growing evidence, shows that vitamin D deficiency and weight gain are associated with impaired physical and mental well-being. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of Pilates training and vitamin D supplementation on quality of life and mental health of overweight men.

This study was a randomized clinical trial performed by pre-test and post-test design. Initially, 50 overweight men were selected by convenience sampling method and then randomly divided into 4 groups including control, exercise, vitamin D and combined groups. The exercise and combined groups performed 8 weeks of Pilates training with the intensity of 50-75% of reserve heart rate, 3sessions/week. The vitamin D and combined groups received 50,000 IU vitamin D/week. Research tools were included the quality of life (SF-36) and general health (GHQ) questionnaires. The data were analyzed by paired t test, one way ANOVA and Kruskal Wallis tests (p˂0.05).

 Ethical Considerations:

 This study with research ethics code IR.IAU.BABOL.REC.1398.088 has been approved by research ethics committee at Islamic Azad University, Babol Branch, Iran

Vitamin D status in subjects was lower than normal (less than 30 ng/ml). Eight weeks of Pilates training, vitamin D intake and the combined intervention were associated with a significant improve in quality of life )10.57%, 9.26% and 15.75%, respectively (and the increased mental health (12.66%, 10.72% and 17.90%, respectively). However, the effect of combined intervention focused method was more noticeable on the quality of life (p<0.001) and mental health (p<0.001) compared with two other interventions.

Based on the findings, it seems that any of the Pilates training, vitamin D and combination interventions can improve the quality of life and mental health in overweight people with low levels of vitamin D, but the combination intervention is more effective on these variables.