Background & Objectives: With regards to the importance of health and Quality of Life improvement in the elderly in relation with physical activity and self esteem, the aim of this study was to determine the effect of programmed exercise on the self esteem of elderly residents in the nursing home of Rasht city in 2008.

  Methods: This study included a pretest and post test on 32 qualified samples. The Rosenberg self esteem scale were filled by them. Then, they attended a programmed exercise for one month. The scale was filled again by participants. The collected pre-test and pot-test data were analyzed using a-t-test SPSS software.

  Results: The average age of the participants was 73.53 (± 8.31). Most of them were widowed, 43.8% had no children, 87.5% were uneducated and the rest (12.5%) had a primary level of education. 37.2 of them had resided in the nursing home for less than one year and their average of residence was 1357±17.11 days. The source of income for 59.4% of participants was through children and relations. 27 persons (84.4%) had frequent visits with relations. 34.4% of them had a disease in history. There were significant correlations between number of children, marriage, education and job and number of previous jobs, gender job and education and number of previous job, visit frequency and education and time of the last visit. The correlation between sums of self esteem scores before and after the exercise was positive and significant and 22.81±4.84 Average of self esteem score before and after programmed exercise was 26.84±4.35.

  Conclusion: Regular exercise is effective in improving the self-esteem among the elderly and it can recommend to the elderly as a safe and cheap method.