Can Exercise Ease Menopausal Hot Flushes?

This review gathered 21 randomised trials, with 2,884 women, testing whether structured exercise relieves the vasomotor symptoms of menopause, meaning hot flushes and night sweats. Compared with no treatment, exercise reduced the severity of these symptoms, though it did not clearly change how frequently they occurred. That split, easing intensity while leaving frequency much the same, is an honest and slightly humbling result, and the trials varied in the type and amount of exercise used. Exercise also tends to bring the wider gains women value in these years, for mood, sleep and cardiovascular health, which count even where its effect on flushes is partial. For a woman weighing how to handle the menopause transition, it supports movement as a worthwhile, low-risk part of the picture, alongside the treatments with stronger effects on the symptoms themselves.