Naidoo Dhevaksha, Schembri Adrian, Cohen Marc
School of Health and Biomedical Sciences, RMIT University, Plenty Rd, Bundoora, Bundoora, VIC, 3083, Australia.
Cogstate Limited, Melbourne, 3000, Australia.
BMC Complement Altern Med. 2018 Jan 10;18(1):8. doi: 10.1186/s12906-017-2078-4.
Unhealthy lifestyles are a major factor in the development and exacerbation of many chronic diseases. Improving lifestyles though immersive residential experiences that promote healthy behaviours is a focus of the health retreat industry. This systematic review aims to identify and explore published studies on the health, wellbeing and economic impact of retreat experiences.
MEDLINE, CINAHL and PsychINFO databases were searched for residential retreat studies in English published prior to February 2017. Studies were included if they were written in English, involved an intervention program in a residential setting of one or more nights, and included before-and-after data related to the health of participants. Studies that did not meet the above criteria or contained only descriptive data from interviews or case studies were excluded.
A total of 23 studies including eight randomised controlled trials, six non-randomised controlled trials and nine longitudinal cohort studies met the inclusion criteria. These studies included a total of 2592 participants from diverse geographical and demographic populations and a great heterogeneity of outcome measures, with seven studies examining objective outcomes such as blood pressure or biological makers of disease, and 16 studies examining subjective outcomes that mostly involved self-reported questionnaires on psychological and spiritual measures. All studies reported post-retreat health benefits ranging from immediately after to five-years post-retreat. Study populations varied widely and most studies had small sample sizes, poorly described methodology and little follow-up data, and no studies reported on health economic outcomes or adverse effects, making it difficult to make definite conclusions about specific conditions, safety or return on investment.
Health retreat experiences appear to have health benefits that include benefits for people with chronic diseases such as multiple sclerosis, various cancers, HIV/AIDS, heart conditions and mental health. Future research with larger numbers of subjects and longer follow-up periods are needed to investigate the health impact of different retreat experiences and the clinical populations most likely to benefit. Further studies are also needed to determine the economic benefits of retreat experiences for individuals, as well as for businesses, health insurers and policy makers.
不健康的生活方式是许多慢性病发生和加剧的主要因素。通过促进健康行为的沉浸式居住体验来改善生活方式是健康疗养行业的一个重点。本系统综述旨在识别和探索已发表的关于疗养体验对健康、幸福感和经济影响的研究。
检索MEDLINE、CINAHL和PsychINFO数据库，查找2017年2月之前发表的英文居住疗养研究。如果研究用英文撰写，涉及一个或多个晚上的居住环境中的干预项目，并包括与参与者健康相关的前后数据，则纳入研究。不符合上述标准或仅包含访谈或案例研究的描述性数据的研究被排除。
共有23项研究符合纳入标准，其中包括8项随机对照试验、6项非随机对照试验和9项纵向队列研究。这些研究共有来自不同地理和人口统计学群体的2592名参与者，结果测量存在很大异质性，7项研究检查客观结果，如血压或疾病的生物学标志物，16项研究检查主观结果，主要涉及关于心理和精神测量的自我报告问卷。所有研究都报告了疗养后的健康益处，从疗养后立即到疗养后五年。研究人群差异很大，大多数研究样本量小，方法描述不佳，随访数据少，没有研究报告健康经济结果或不良反应，因此难以就特定情况、安全性或投资回报得出明确结论。
健康疗养体验似乎对健康有益，包括对患有慢性病如多发性硬化症、各种癌症、艾滋病毒/艾滋病、心脏病和心理健康问题的人有益。需要进行更多受试者和更长随访期的未来研究，以调查不同疗养体验对健康的影响以及最可能受益的临床人群。还需要进一步研究以确定疗养体验对个人以及企业、健康保险公司和政策制定者的经济效益。
