In view of the potential risks of tolerance and dependency and the large number of other drugs that older individuals frequently take in conjunction with insomnia medication, GW786034 clinical trial an evidence-based non-drug approach is of interest. In the

National Health Interview Libraries Survey analysis (Pearson 2006), it was reported that over 1.6 million civilian adult US citizens use complementary and alternative medicine to treat insomnia. Previous reviews have reported that non-pharmacological treatments are as effective as pharmacological therapies for older patients with insomnia (Montgomery and Dennis 2003, Montgomery and Dennis 2004, Morin et al 1999b). The non-pharmacological treatments that have been studied include providing sleep hygiene advice and cognitive What is already known on this topic: The inability

to fall asleep or maintain sleep increases with age, causing fatigue and daytime sleepiness, which impair quality of life. Although effective medications for insomnia exist, they may have side effects, including falls and cognitive impairment in older people. What this review adds: Regular aerobic or resistance exercise training significantly improves sleep quality in adults over 40 years of age. Those who exercised perceived significantly reduced time taken to fall asleep after selleck products going to bed and reduced medication use for insomnia. Exercise programs are also recommended to help prevent and treat sleep disorders (Youngstedt 2005) as well as the depression associated with these disorders among the elderly (Singh aminophylline et al 1997, Singh 2001). Having infrequent adverse effects and a low cost, participation in a community-based exercise program may be a favourable and easily accessible means of preventing and treating sleep problems among middle-aged and elderly populations. However, several meta-analyses examining the effect of exercise training on sleep (Kubitz et al 1996, Montgomery and Dennis 2002) yielded equivocal findings due to the small number of trials examined and

the limited number of participants in those trials. Since those studies were published, new evidence from additional randomised trials has become available. Therefore, the research question for this systematic review was: Does an aerobic or resistance exercise training program improve sleep quality in middle-aged and older adults with sleep problems? We searched six electronic databases (PubMed, MEDLINE, CINAHL, EMBASE, the Cochrane Library, and Chinese Electronic Periodical Service) from the earliest available date to April 2012 using keywords for insomnia (insomnia, sleep problems, sleep disorder, sleep complaints, sleep disturbance, sleep quality) and for exercise (exercise, physical activity, physical therapy). We limited the search results to full-text articles written in English or Chinese.