Email Nudges Help Boost Exercise Capacity for People with Parkinson’s Disease

Pilot study shows benefits of regular reminders to encourage physical activity 

Baltimore (April 25, 2025)—Getting enough exercise can be especially helpful—and especially challenging—for people with Parkinson’s disease. In a new study, patients who received a weekly email newsletter with Parkinson’s-specific exercise tips saw a significant improvement in exercise capacity after 12 weeks. Researchers will present their work this week at the 2025 American Physiology Summit in Baltimore. The Summit is the flagship annual meeting of the American Physiological Society (APS).

“For people with Parkinson’s disease, even small increases in exercise capacity can make a meaningful difference in daily life, potentially improving mobility, endurance, strength and overall well-being,” said the study’s first author Brittany R. Lyon, a doctoral student at the University of Oregon. “Staying active and incorporating intentional and goal-oriented exercise into your routine will always be more beneficial than living an inactive lifestyle.”

Exercise can help to alleviate many of the common symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, but patients often worry about falling or are unsure how to exercise safely. As a result, many people report reducing their physical activity after being diagnosed with Parkinson’s.

For the new study, researchers created an email newsletter to provide exercise tips and encouragement tailored for people with Parkinson’s. Each newsletter included suggested exercises, workout videos and fun challenges related to themes such as aerobics, strength, balance and flexibility, along with explanations about why these activities are beneficial for managing the disease.

Researchers sent the email newsletters to 14 adults with Parkinson’s disease each week for 12 weeks. Half of the participants also met with a research team member every other week to discuss the information provided in the emails and ask questions for more personalized support.

Compared to baseline, study participants saw a significant improvement in two measures of exercise capacity at 12 weeks, including total work, a measure of the amount of energy expended during exercise, and VO2peak, a measure of oxygen consumption during exercise. There was no significant change in total physical activity level or the severity of Parkinson’s symptoms.

Researchers noted that participants who had biweekly counseling sessions saw a trend toward greater activity level, fitness capacity and muscle endurance compared with those who only received emails, but the difference between groups was not statistically significant.

“While biweekly counseling meetings didn’t show clear benefits, there were signs they might help improve exercise ability and activity levels when combined with weekly exercise educational emails,” said Lyon. “These results suggest that some individuals may greatly benefit from additional support.”

Overall, the findings offer preliminary evidence that email newsletters could be an effective approach for encouraging people with Parkinson’s disease to get more exercise and better manage their symptoms. Researchers said repeating the study with more participants could help to confirm the findings, clarify whether in-person counseling provides added benefit, and determine whether the improvements in exercise capacity are sustained over time and lead to meaningful changes in daily function and quality of life as the disease progresses.

Lyon conducted the research at California State University, Sacramento with California State University Associate Professors Gwénaëlle Begue, PhD, and Matt Brown, PhD, along with undergraduate students Yessenia Marquez, Kyler Neu and Caty Bayless.

NOTE TO JOURNALISTS: The American Physiology Summit will be held April 24–27, 2025, in Baltimore. To schedule an interview with the researchers, conference organizers or presenters, or to request abstract A-1816, “Effectiveness of a 12-Week Educational Exercise Intervention on Improving Physical Activity, Exercise Capacity and Symptoms in People with Parkinson’s Disease,” contact APS Media Relations or call 301.634.7314. Find more highlights from the meeting in our Newsroom. 

Physiology is a broad area of scientific inquiry that focuses on how molecules, cells, tissues and organs function in health and disease. The American Physiological Society connects a global, multidisciplinary community of more than 10,000 biomedical scientists and educators as part of its mission to advance scientific discovery, understand life and improve health. The Society drives collaboration and spotlights scientific discoveries through its 16 scholarly journals and programming that support researchers and educators in their work.