For women in their fifties, staying or becoming active may be to quality of life what putting money into a 401k is to retirement savings, an investment that will pay off in long term.
Combined with existing studies, this new work adds to the growing evidence for the benefits of maintaining or adopting an active lifestyle in middle age, says Binh Nguyen, PhD, lead author and researcher at the Prevention Research Collaborative from the University of Sydney in Australia.
Our results suggest that to maintain a good physical health-related quality of life around age 70, earlier inactivity can be compensated for by becoming active in the mid-fifties. It may be possible to turn back the clock in middle age through lifestyle changes like physical activity, Dr. Nguyen says.
Physical activity has proven health benefits
Regular exercise in middle age is linked to a better quality of life later
Although the link between physical activity and health-related quality of life has been shown before, these trials are usually short-term or have only looked at one point in time, the authors say. The current study is unique in that it examined physical activity levels at various times during women’s midlife to explore how different patterns of physical activity influence quality of life in later life, both from a perspective of physical and mental health, says Nguyen.
For this study, researchers used data collected at three-year intervals starting in 1996 from more than 11,000 women in the Australian Longitudinal Study of Women’s Health. The women were between 47 and 52 years old when the study began.
All participants were classified into one of three groups:
- Meet the WHO physical activity guidelines of 150 minutes of activity per week consistently over the fifteen year period followed
- Not meeting the guidelines when the trial began, but starting to meet them at age 55, 60, or 65
- Never follow the guidelines
Health-related quality of life was assessed using a physical health composite score and a mental health composite score from a survey including 36 questions on functional health and well-being.
The physical part of the survey includes questions about general health, activities such as walking, climbing stairs, doing activities such as vacuuming or bowling, and how physical health problems interfere with daily activities. Emotional health questions relate to the impact of emotional problems or physical pain on your life and daily activities.
On average, women who consistently met physical activity guidelines and those who began meeting guidelines at age 55 had a composite physical score 3 points higher. The effect of physical activity on physical quality of life is significant even after controlling for socioeconomic factors and preexisting health diagnoses. However, there was no significant association between physical activity and the mental and emotional part of the survey.
We found that consistently meeting the WHO physical activity guidelines (150 minutes of activity per week) over 15 years was associated with better physical health in later life, compared to not meeting the guidelines at all , says Nguyen.
I hope the study’s findings will inspire middle-aged women to stay active or increase their activity. Ideally, women should increase their activity levels to meet physical activity guidelines by age 55, Nguyen says.
It’s not too late to start being physically active
Overall, this is a great public health message because it supports other published literature that suggests the same thing, says Deborah Kado, MD, a geriatrician at Stanford Health and co-director of the Stanford Longevity Center, both in Palo Alto, California. .
“I think it’s always reassuring to find evidence to suggest that if one makes an effort to change a behavior, in that case one will find positive rewards, better self-reported physical health years later,” says Dr. Kado, who did not participate in the study. So if one is already physically active and meets the 150 minute weekly guideline, these study results would support them wanting to continue what they are doing. For those who aren’t physically active enough to meet the 150-minute weekly guideline, perhaps the message should be, it’s not too late to start, Kado says.
Data collected on physical activity and physical and mental health assessments were self-reported, and the assessments are subjective measures, Kado says. Therefore, caution must be exercised when attributing causality, meaning that we cannot conclude that it was definitely physical activity and not something else that might have led to better physical health self-reported, she says.
Men would also benefit from regular exercise
Although there are many differences between women and men, I believe that in the realm of physical activity, both sexes benefit from continued or increased regular physical activity as they age, Kado says.
The link between physical activity and mental health was not as strong
Is it surprising that mental and emotional health is not improved by regular and consistent exercise? It’s not that mental health hasn’t improved, it just hasn’t improved as much, says Nguyen. There could be several reasons why we observed weaker effects on the mental health components of quality of life. Perhaps the study period wasn’t long enough to see all the effects, or physical activity might affect the physical and mental health components of quality of life differently, he says.
Even short bouts of movement count toward weekly activity goals
You don’t have to spend hours in the gym every week to meet activity guidelines (unless, of course, you want to). Every little extra activity you do during the week counts, including things like taking the stairs or going for a 10-minute bike ride around the neighborhood.
While previous recommendations said an exercise session had to last at least 10 minutes to count toward weekly fitness goals, the latest guidance says any activity, even things like a brisk walk around the parking lot or vacuuming the house counts towards your daily activity. goals
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