Despite what your smartphone says, you can reap the benefits of walking even if you don’t walk 10,000 steps every day. Walking is one of the most beneficial types of physical activity for overall health.
Numerous studies back up the claim that lengthy, leisurely walks are preferable to hard running or rigorous exercise. This is especially true for middle-aged individuals who are not accustomed to exercise.
These are the steps that studies say you need to take if you are over 60
The first benefit of walking for more than 30 minutes a day is that it burns calories. You also do not have to put in a lot of effort or feel exhausted. Walking is known to burn more fat than other, more rigorous exercises.
Walking improves cardiovascular and circulatory health and decreases harmful cholesterol. However, it also benefits our brain and, as a result, our mental health as well as our cardiovascular health.
Regular moderate exercise has been found in research to dramatically reduce mental health problems such as depression, insomnia, and accumulated stress.
The study, published in JAMA Cardiology, looked at the habits of 6,000 women over the age of 63. For a week, they each wore a step and physical activity sensor/tracker. On average, 3,600 steps were taken every day.
During the 7.5-year research, 400 of the women who participated experienced heart failure. To put it another way, constriction or restriction of the arteries that provide blood and oxygen to the heart is a prelude to more serious cardiovascular events.
When compared to physical activity, the findings were straightforward: women who engaged in non-intense physical activity for more than 70 minutes per day had a 12% decreased risk of circulatory system illness.
Consider home activities such as cleaning, making beds, and caring for others. Those who did moderate-to-intense exercise for 30 minutes had a 16% decreased risk.
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This includes activities such as gardening, stair climbing, and daily walking. However, for every hour and a half of idle activity each day, the chance of heart failure increased by 17%.
With 3,600 steps, there are already benefits
Overall, the study discovered that walking as few as 3,600 steps per day at a steady pace would help women over the age of 63 by reducing their risk of heart failure by 26%. This finding is notable because, according to lead researcher Michael LaMonte, 3,000 steps per day “is a reasonable target” for women over 63.
According to LaMonte, heart failure with intact ejection fraction is the most common cause of heart failure in women over 60, with few “established treatment options” available. As a result, it is even “more important to prevent” this type of heart failure.
According to Mercedes Carnethon, PhD, a professor of epidemiology and pulmonary and critical care medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago and vice chair of the department of preventive medicine, these findings highlight the importance of physical activity in maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
Dr. Carnethon, who was not involved in the study, believes it is a huge accomplishment in our field to know that a controllable habit, such as how much exercise one does and how much time one spends sitting down, can have such powerful benefits in preventing heart failure.
The study aimed to determine the impact of daily steps, light-intensity exercise, and sitting time on the risk of heart failure in women aged 63 to 99. The approximately 6,000 women, who were 17% Hispanic, 34% Black, and 49% white, had an average age of 79 and were clear of heart failure at the start.
Participants wore an accelerometer on their hips for seven days in a row from March 2012 to April 2014. The women spent an average of 340 minutes, or slightly more than 5.5 hours, per day on light-intensity tasks such as blow-drying their hair or unloading the dishwasher. They sat for about 10 hours and 20 minutes per day on average.
