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What single behaviour is most important to your health? If you answered, exercise, you’re right. It might come as a surprise to some, but it turns out that exercise contributes more to our good health than any other single lifestyle measure, including eating a healthy diet.

Exercise is extremely important. After all, we were made to move. Physical activity improves overall health, but it also has numerous benefits for particular conditions. Specifically, exercise
• is more effective in preventing and reducing back pain than many popular interventions,
• prevents or limits osteoporosis,
• reduces risk of developing cataracts and age-related macular degeneration,
• reduces pain and depressed mood in patients with Fibromyalgia, and
• improves movement in people with Parkinson’s disease and facilitates neuroplasticity, the brain's ability to form new connections.

The physical advantages of regular exercise are too numerous to list here. Exercise provides many benefits to brain health, too. Studies have shown that exercise improves cognitive function in adults and children, reduces the risk of dementia and lessens the effects of dementia in those who have it.
It’s never too late to begin an exercise program and almost everyone can participate in some form of physical exercise. Changing sedentary habits and becoming more active can be difficult, though. Many people start an exercise program, only to quit after a few weeks. Here are a few tips to help you begin and stay with a regular exercise program:

• Purchase screen time with exercise. For every minute of exercise you get each day, you can buy one minute of screen time.
• Meet with a friend and encourage one another to stick with it.
• Join a gym.
• Do what you love.
• Mark your calendar. Treat your daily appointment as you would a doctor’s appointment. After all, your health is important.
• Reward yourself for reaching fitness goals with non-food incentives.
Remember that exercising is not an excuse for eating junk or indulging in health-zapping treats. Regular exercise combined with healthy eating is a powerful defense against disease.
• Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, “Physical Activity Fundamental To Preventing Disease,” US Department of Health and Human Services, http://aspe.hhs.gov/health/reports/physicalactivity/ (Accessed March 30, 2014).
• Winfried Häuser, Petra Klose, Jost Langhorst, Babak Moradi, Mario Steinbach, Marcus Schiltenwolf, andAngela Busch, “Efficacy of different types of aerobic exercise in fibromyalgia syndrome: a systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials,” US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2911859/ (Accessed March 30, 2014).
• G. M. Petzinger, B. E. Fisher, S. McEwen, J. A. Beeler, J. P. Walsh, and M. W. Jakowec, “Exercise-enhanced Neuroplasticity Targeting Motor and Cognitive Circuitry in Parkinson’s Disease,” US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3690528/ (Accessed March 30, 2014).
• Jody Braverman, “The Best Exercises for Lymphatic Drainage,” livestrong.com, http://www.livestrong.com/article/93406-exercises-lymphatic-drainage/ (Accessed March 30, 2014).
• Phillip D. Tomporowski, Catherine L. Davis, [...], and Jack A. Naglieri, “Exercise and Children’s Intelligence, Cognition, and Academic Achievement,” PMC, http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2748863/ (Accessed March 30, 2014).
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