Pilot study to evaluate the effects of a physical exercise program in the inflammatory profile of breast cancer survivors

• Autor(a) principal: Soares, Anabela Monteiro
• Data de Publicação: 2021
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10773/34611
• topic: Breast cancer; Cancer treatments; Immune system; Metabolism; Inflammation; Physical exercise

Breast cancer is the most common cancer and the most frequent cause of death among women. Cancer treatments tends to be aggressive, which negatively affects the quality of life not only for patients, but also of cancer survivors. Breast cancer survivors suffer from sequelae left by treatments, such as inflammation, fatigue, pain and dysfunctions in the immune system and metabolism. Regular practice of physical exercise may mitigate those sequelae. Physical exercise brings benefits, from psychological and physical well-being, decreased inflammation to stimulation of the immune system. That said, this project aimed to investigate the effect of an 8-week physical program MAMA_MOVE GAIA AFTER TREATMENT (MMGAT) with the use of aerobic and resistance training in the inflammatory profile of breast cancer survivors. Cytokines were quantified in serum samples from 16 participants at two moments: MC1 (before exercise) and ME1 (8 weeks of intervention). Immune cells and biochemical parameters were also evaluated. A correlation analysis was performed between immune cells, cytokines and metabolic markers. No significant changes were found in the levels of cytokines, except IL-10, where a decreased occurred. However, a tendency to decrease was observed in 50% of the participants in the cytokines IL-2, IL-4, IL-6, TNF-α and in 12 participants in IFN-γ. For immune cells, there was only a significant decrease in neutrophils. Finally, the metabolic markers, these remained within normal. The results indicate that the combined physical training did not alter the inflammatory profile of breast cancer survivors. However, physical exercise showed a tendency to reduce pro-inflammatory cytokines, which is beneficial to improve the inflammatory profile of breast cancer survivors. Further studies with a large number of samples and with a physical program with more duration may provide data with statistical significance, regarding the role of physical exercise in breast cancer survivors.