2026-10-12T02:37:57Z https://api.figshare.com/v2/oai

oai:figshare.com:article/33981577 2026-09-24T11:12:20Z category_7 portal_147 item_type_3 month_year_09_2026

Supplemental Material for: Does high-intensity exercise combined with exposure sessions improve treatment outcomes in obsessive-compulsive disorder? A randomized controlled trial in inpatients. figshare admin karger (2628495) Mark Muehlbacher (25103671) Rebecca Schennach (25103676) Thomas Boesl (25103677) Christoph Bamberg (18712281) Koch, Stefan (5373070) Ulrich Voderholzer (316093) Medicine Medicine <p dir="ltr">Introduction: Physical exercise administered before or after exposure has been shown to have beneficial effects on treatment outcomes in anxiety- and trauma-related disorders. However, this approach has not yet been examined for obsessive–compulsive disorder (OCD). This randomized controlled trial investigated whether high-intensity exercise administered immediately after exposure therapy improves treatment outcomes in patients with OCD. </p><p dir="ltr">Methods: Ninety-seven inpatients with OCD participated in an eight-week exposure-based treatment phase during inpatient care, comprising two sessions per week, and were randomly assigned to either high-intensity exercise (ExpoHI) or low-intensity control (ExpoLI) administered immediately after a standardized exposure and response prevention (ERP) session. OCD severity was assessed using the Yale–Brown Obsessive Compulsive Scale (Y-BOCS) at admission, discharge, and six-month follow-up. The secondary outcomes included general psychopathological symptoms. </p><p dir="ltr">Results: ExpoHI showed significantly greater reductions in Y-BOCS scores at discharge (between-group difference: −3.14 points, p = .009), corresponding to a moderate-to-large between-group effect size (Cohen’s d = 0.76), which was maintained at the six-month follow-up (p = .030; Cohen’s d = 0.68). Responder rates at discharge were significantly higher in the ExpoHI group (85.4%) than in the ExpoLI group (61.2%) (p = .011), whereas remission rates did not differ between groups. ExpoHI also showed greater reductions in depressive symptoms at follow-up. </p><p dir="ltr">Conclusions: High-intensity exercise immediately following exposure therapy produced greater reductions in obsessive–compulsive symptoms than the active control condition. These findings suggest that exercise may be a feasible adjunct for exposure-based treatment.</p> 2026-09-24T11:12:20Z Dataset Dataset 10.6084/m9.figshare.33981577.v1 https://figshare.com/articles/dataset/Supplemental_Material_for_Does_high-intensity_exercise_combined_with_exposure_sessions_improve_treatment_outcomes_in_obsessive-compulsive_disorder_A_randomized_controlled_trial_in_inpatients_/33981577 CC BY 4.0