Dance Intervention Improves Girls’ Health

I’ve always thought that dancing can help us feel better. But we have to be careful too that we are not surrounded by self-destruction when we go dancing, i.e. things like alcohol, tobacco, or drug abuse which more than nullify any positive effects from dancing.

CHICAGO– A dance intervention program improved the self-rated health of Swedish girls with internalizing problems, such as stress and psychosomatic symptoms, according to a report of a study published Online First by Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine, a JAMA Network publication.

Exercise is considered a strategy to prevent and treat depression in school-aged youth and has been shown to promote positive feelings, enhance confidence to cope with problems, and increase confidence and self-control, the authors write in the study background.

Ann Duberg, R.P.T., of the Centre for Health Care Sciences, Örebro County Council and Örebro University, Sweden, and colleagues conducted a randomized controlled intervention trial with 112 girls (ages 13 to 18 years) with internalizing problems who had repeat visits to the school nurse for psychosomatic symptoms, such as pain in the head, stomach, neck, back and/or shoulder, and for persistent feelings of tiredness, being worried or being in low spirits.

Read the full press release: Dance Intervention Improves Self-Rated Health of Girls With Internalizing Problems