Maybe we should start calling them mental health clubs? New research out of the University of California at Davis Medical Center has found that exercise may be an effective way to treat depression and anxiety.

The study, published in The Journal of Neuroscience, found working out increases levels of neurotransmitters glutamate and GABA, brain chemicals that are depleted in the brains of people with depression and anxiety.

Lead researcher Richard Maddock, a professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences, said the findings should encourage more doctors and patients to consider exercise as therapy for these two conditions.

“Major depressive disorder is often characterized by depleted glutamate and GABA, which return to normal when mental health is restored,” said Maddock in a university press statement. “Our study shows that exercise activates the metabolic pathway that replenishes these neurotransmitters.

“From a metabolic standpoint, vigorous exercise is the most demanding activity the brain encounters, much more intense than calculus or chess, but nobody knows what happens with all that energy. Apparently, one of the things it’s doing is making more neurotransmitters.”

The study involved more than three dozen volunteers who rode stationary bicycles at a vigorous rate — about 85 percent of their maximum heart rate — for up to 20 minutes in three sessions. MRI scans were used to detect GABA and glutamate levels in their brains before and after the exercise sessions.

The scans showed significant increases in the brain chemicals in parts of the brain that govern cognitive functions. The volunteers who exercised at least three a week had the greatest, most long-lasting effects.