According to this randomised controlled trial, exercise does not work as a treatment for depressed adults. Melanie Chalder and colleagues found that the addition of a facilitated exercise intervention to usual care did not improve depression outcome or reduce the use of antidepressants compared with usual care alone.

The paper is part of a bundle of papers published to coincide with the World Family Doctors Caring for People (WONCA) conference in Vienna in July 2012. The other papers include a randomised controlled trial on the clinical and cost effectiveness of booklet based vestibular rehabilitation for chronic dizziness in primary care, and a paper on the validation of two age dependent D-dimer cut-off values for exclusion of deep vein thrombosis in suspected elderly patients in primary care. Read these and other research articles at bmj.com/research. And let us know what you think by leaving a rapid response to any of the papers.


Best wishes,

Fiona Godlee
Editor in Chief, BMJ