Resistance Exercise Training Improves Oxidant-Antioxidant Balance and Vascular Function in Young Females with Anxiety, Mood, and/or Trauma-Related Disorders

PURPOSE: Mental health disorders (MHD) are prevalent in young females, who also face higher cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk compared to age-matched males. Standard treatments like cognitive therapy or medications may not be effective at lowering CVD risk. Resistance exercise training (RET) shows potential to improve psychological symptoms of MHD, but its effects on early CVD markers, such as oxidative stress and microvascular dysfunction, remain unclear. This study investigated whether RET could mitigate CVD risk in young females with anxiety, mood, or trauma-related MHD. The hypothesis was that RET would improve both CVD precursors and psychological symptoms in young females diagnosed with anxiety, mood, and/or trauma-related MHD. METHODS: Twenty-four young females diagnosed with anxiety, mood, and/or trauma-related MHD took part in 10 weeks of RET. Psychological MHD symptoms (anxiety and depression specific), resting blood pressure (BP), and early development markers of CVD (oxidative stress assessed via whole blood superoxide production; microvascular function assessed via vascular conductance (VC) responses following single upper limb muscle contractions) were evaluated prior to and immediately following RET. To determine the effectiveness of RET based on pre-RET values (e.g. “high” vs “low” values), each precursor was separated into sub-groups using median-splits. RESULTS: When all participants were examined together, 10-weeks of RET significantly improved psychological MHD symptoms (p < 0.01 for all), resting BP (MAP (Pre-RET: 88 ± 7; Post-RET: 84 ± 9 mmHg); p < 0.01), microvascular function (VC area-under-the curve (Pre-RET: 0.22 ± 0.12; Post-RET: 0.34 ± 0.20 ml.min -1 ; p < 0.01), and oxidative stress (Pre-RET: 30253 ± 10483; Post-RET: 18881 ± 9632 AU; p = 0.02). Median-splits of all variables revealed the improvements in resting BP and microvascular function were independent of pre-RET values. The median-split analysis for oxidative stress revealed that RET (group x RET interaction effect: p = 0.04) was most impactful in participants with the highest pre-RET oxidative stress (Pre-RET: 41542 ± 12461; Post-RET: 25791 ± 13278 AU; p < 0.01), with no significant changes in those reporting the lowest pre-RET oxidative stress values (“low” group: p = 0.37). CONCLUSION: This study revealed the RET acts a robust intervention to significantly improve negative psychological symptoms and reduce CVD risk, evident by lowering resting BP and improving microvascular function in young females with anxiety, mood, and/or trauma-related MHD. Specific to oxidant-antioxidant balance, the influence of RET was also observed with the greatest benefit shown in the participants reporting the highest pre-RET oxidative stress. This abstract was presented at the American Physiology Summit 2025 and is only available in HTML format. There is no downloadable file or PDF version. The Physiology editorial board was not involved in the peer review process.