The health benefits associated with martial arts include strengthen and self-efficacy of the elderly, reduced falls, increased exercise capacity, and benefits to the immune system and autonomic nervous system.
They are seemingly inappropriate for people with impairments. They are however also an opportunity for comprehensive rehabilitation. A sport training has primarily a curative, preventive and psychological function. Practising combat sports and strength sports gives people with disabilities the opportunity to be more self-sufficient, assertive and financially independent. Their self-esteem improves due to the sport, they feel more important and needed. Martial arts are as a physical and meditative discipline also available as complementary strategies able to improve functional capacity, physical performances, postural control of patients suffering from chronical diseases. They can slow their clinical evolution.