Exercise Staves Off Disability
Get more active to keep your independence.
by Rosanna Scott and Donna Rae Siegfried.
Posted 2/17/07
It’s time to make a choice: Use your body or lose your independence. Moving even just a bit more than you do now may be enough to ensure you maintain your ability to do daily activities like bathe, dress, cook and clean.
How? A recent study shows that without regular physical activity, a person with arthritis nearly doubles their decline in function. Eventually the decline may result in the inability to perform the basic daily tasks essential for living alone. The study of more than 5,700 men and women aged 65 and older who had arthritis found that people who led a sedentary life, particularly women and minorities, decreased their ability to perform the basic functional tasks of daily living, says lead researcher Dorothy D. Dunlop, PhD, an Arthritis Foundation-funded researcher from Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine and Rehabilitation Institute in Chicago.
A second recent study shows that older people who are able to be physically active but choose not to be have a higher risk of mobility problems. The Health, Aging and Body Composition Study followed 3,075 men and women aged 70 to 79 for seven years. When the study began, none of the participants had trouble walking one-quarter of a mile or climbing 10 steps. But 4.5 years later, 34 percent of the men and 47 percent of the women developed problems walking or climbing stairs. The people who were inactive at the beginning of the study had the greatest decline.
The researchers discovered that mobility loss in older, inactive people can be reduced by adopting an active lifestyle, such as walking 1.5 to 2 hours per week. And it is never too late to start, says fitness expert Denise Austin of Washington, D.C., who has starred in television exercise programs and videos for 25 years. “Muscles in the body will respond, if they are given the opportunity to do so, regardless of age and current activity level. Muscle has a wonderful memory,” she says.
Austin offers three tips for going from sedentary to active:
1. Break up your routine. Time spent exercising is cumulative, says Austin, which means you don’t have to do an hour at a time to obtain healthy benefits. Moving for 10 minutes at a time provides benefit. And give yourself credit for the time you spend housecleaning, walking your dog and doing other chores.
2. Make it fun. Doing activities that you enjoy may seem less burdensome than forcing yourself to go through a program you dislike. Involving your family and friends allows you to spend quality time together while benefiting from exercise.
3. Start out slow and build up your strength. Incorporate short periods of exercise into your life and gradually lengthen how long or how often you do them. The more exercise you do, the more benefits you will receive. In addition to reducing your risk of disability and improving your chance of maintaining independence, you’ll gain energy, reduce stress and decrease fatigue.
Even Moderate Activity Helps
Among adults with knee osteoarthritis (OA), engaging in moderate physical activity just three times a week can reduce the risk of arthritis-related disability by 47 percent.
Source: Archives of Internal Medicine; Vol. 161, No. 19
(Arthritis Today, Sept-Oct 2005)
