Women might need a lot fewer daily steps to lower their risk of heart failure than they think, a new study suggests. The usual recommendation is that people get 10,000 steps a day, but women ages 63 and older actually gain solid heart benefits from around 3,600 steps daily, researchers report Fev. 21 in the journal JAMA Cardiology. On average, 3,600 steps a day at a normal pace was associated with a 26% lower risk of developing heart failure, results show. “Accumulating 3,000 steps per day might be a reasonable target that would be consistent with the amount of daily activity performed by women in this study,” said lead researcher Michael LaMonte, a research professor of epidemiology and environmental health with the University of Buffalo’s School of Public Health and Health Professions. For this study, researchers analyzed data from nearly 6,000 U.S. women ages 63 and older. Participants wore a motion tracker on their hip for up to seven consecutive days, except for when in water. They averaged nearly 3,600 steps a day. Among these women, more than 400 heart failure cases occurred during an average 7.5 years’ follow-up. The risk of developing heart failure was 12% lower for each 70 minutes a day spent in light intensity exercises and 16% lower for each 30 minutes daily spent in moderate-to-vigorous intensity activity, results show. By…  read on >  read on >

There’s good news for females who think that men shed pounds faster than women do: New research shows women get more health benefits from exercise than men, even if they put in less effort. When exercising regularly, women’s risk of an early death or fatal heart event drops more than that of men who work out, researchers found. Over two decades, physically active women were 24% less likely to die from any cause and 36% less likely to die from a heart attack, stroke or other heart event, compared to women who don’t exercise. By comparison, men who worked out regularly had a 15% lower risk of early death and a 14% reduced risk of a heart-related death compared to their couch-potato peers. “We hope this study will help everyone, especially women, understand they are poised to gain tremendous benefits from exercise,” said researcher Dr. Susan Cheng, chair of women’s cardiovascular health and population science in the Smidt Heart Institute at Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles. “It is an incredibly powerful way to live healthier and longer,” Cheng added. “Women, on average, tend to exercise less than men, and hopefully these findings inspire more women to add extra movement to their lives.”     For the study, researchers analyzed data from more than 400,000 U.S. adults between the ages of 27 and 61. The data showed that all…  read on >  read on >

THURSDAY, Feb. 15, 2024 (Health Day News) — Schools that want little girls to get plenty of exercise might want to rethink their dress code. A University of Cambridge study of more than 1 million kids in 135 countries found that in countries where most students wear school uniforms, fewer kids get the 60 minutes a day of physical activity recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO).  And regardless of schools’ uniform policies, fewer girls than boys are hitting the benchmark in the early grades, the study found. Researchers noted there was already evidence that little girls aren’t always comfortable participating in active play when they’re wearing skirts or dresses.  While the new study doesn’t prove that uniforms limit kids’ activity, researchers called on schools to consider whether specific uniform designs might encourage or restrict opportunities to be active during the day. “Schools often prefer to use uniforms for various reasons,” said study leader Mairead Ryan, of the University of Cambridge. “We are not trying to suggest a blanket ban on them, but to present new evidence to support decision-making.” Previous, smaller studies have also suggested that uniforms may be a barrier to physical activity. The WHO recommends young people get an average of 60 minutes a day of moderate-intensity physical activity. The difference in percentage of boys and girls meeting the guideline across all…  read on >  read on >

Looking for a workout that will chase the blues away? Try walking, jogging, yoga or strength training, which a new study reports are the most effective exercises for easing depression. These activities can be used on their own or combined with medication and psychotherapy, according to an evidence review published Feb. 14 in the BMJ. While low-intensity activities like walking and yoga are OK, the more vigorous the activity, the bigger the benefits, the Australian-led team found. The World Health Organization estimates that more than 300 million people worldwide have depression. While exercise is often recommended, treatment guidelines and previous research differ on the best ways to prescribe it for depression. To learn more, researchers in Australia and Europe looked at 218 randomized trials that compared exercise with other depression treatments. The studies included more than 14,100 participants.  They found meaningful benefits when exercise was combined with SSRI antidepressants or psychotherapy, suggesting that working out could be beneficial alongside these established treatments.  Researchers reported large reductions in depression for dance and moderate reductions for walking or jogging, yoga, strength training, mixed aerobic exercises and tai chi or qigong.  While walking or jogging helped both men and women, women benefited more from strength training and men from yoga or qigong, the study found. Yoga was more effective in older people, while strength training worked best among…  read on >  read on >

Folks who get regular exercise are less likely to become infected with COVID or develop a severe case requiring a hospital stay, a new study finds. Compared to couch potatoes, adults who adhere to U.S. physical activity guidelines have 10% lower odds of COVID infection and 27% lower odds of hospitalization from it, results in JAMA Network Open show. “This large, unique study in older adults as they navigated the onset of the pandemic provides important support for physical activity in preventing COVID-19 infection and hospitalization that may extend more broadly to enhanced immune function and lessening vulnerability to infections,” senior author Howard Sesso, an associate epidemiologist at Brigham and Women’s Hospital’s Division of Preventive Medicine in Boston, said in a news release. For the study, researchers tracked the health of more than 61,500 older adults involved in three ongoing clinical trials prior to the beginning of the COVID pandemic in 2020. The participants all reported on their lifestyles and exercise, including the time they spent on activities like biking, walking, running and climbing stairs. Using those self-reports, researchers categorized the participants as inactive, insufficiently active or sufficiently active, based on U.S. physical activity guidelines. The guidelines say that adults should get at least 150 to 300 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise or 75 to 150 minutes of vigorous-intensity exercise each week. Examples of moderate-intensity exercise…  read on >  read on >