Introduction: Pilates is a kind of exercise which can decrease pain, improve disability, balance, and functional movement. Due to postmenopausal or other reasons, elderly women may have depression, anxiety, or poor sleep quality, which in turn affect quality of life.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore the effects of Pilates on depression, anxiety, sleep quality, and quality of life in elderly women by literature review.

Method: " Pilates ", depression", "anxiety" ,"sleep quality", "quality of life", ”elderly”, and ”women” were used as key words to search in PubMed, Google Scholar, Science Direct databases to find related literature with randomized controlled trials on the effects of Pilates on the depression, anxiety, sleep quality, or quality of life(QoL) of elderly women.

Results: A total of eight studies were found. Five of which explored the effects of Pilates on QoL. Three of which explored the effects of depression, anxiety, and sleep quality. Four of which focused on the functional movement include walking speed, sit to stand and forward reach balance test. Two of which especially focused on the postmenopausal women about the effect of bone mineral density. Two of which investigated the effects of the pain scale. The intervention program of these studies was performed thirty to sixty minutes, one to two times a week for three to twelve months. The results of these eight clinical studies showed that Pilates group had significantly improvements on the depression, anxiety , sleep quality, or quality of life compared with control group.

Conclusion: Compare to control group , Pilates group had improvements in- QoL, sleep quality, anxiety and depression. It is suggested that Pilates may be a method to improve depression, anxiety, sleep quality, and QoL among elderly women. However, the majority of these studies were conducted in foreign countries, effects of Pilates on Taiwanese elder women was not sure and needs further researches.