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Volume 4, Issue 7
Many cancer survivors are overweight and sedentary
Over the years many studies have pointed to the fact that regular exercise can prevent cancer recurrences and help cancer patients live longer lives. Despite this fact, a recent study by the American Cancer Society indicates that many cancer survivors are not heeding this advice. Cancer survivors have high obesity and physical inactivity rates that mirror that of the general population.
For the study researchers interviewed 114,000 Canadians, asking questions about cancer history, weight, height and physical activity. General population statistics from Canada indicate that 37 percent of Canadians are overweight, 22 percent are obese, and fewer than 22 of the population are physically active. Results from the study were almost identical, with 34 percent overweight and 20 percent obese. In addition, obese breast cancer survivors were 50 percent as likely to engage in physical activity as obese women who hadn't had cancer.
1
The first signs of heart disease in men appear during teenage years
Heart disease is the number one killer of both men and women in the United States, however men are at higher risk for the disease. A new study has found that the indicators that point to this higher risk first appear in boys during adolescence.
Researchers at the University of Minnesota Children's Hospital studied a group of 507 boys and girls, from ages 11 until 19. At the beginning of the study boys and girls had similar body composition, blood pressure and blood lipid levels. Over the years body fat percentage decreased for boys and increased for girls. While intuitively this would point to a point to an increased risk of heart disease for girls, this is not the case. In fact the opposite is true--levels of triglycerides increased in boys and went down in girls, while HDL ÒgoodÓ cholesterol decreased in boys an increased in girls.
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Exercise helps reduce risk of preterm birth
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 12.8 precent of babies United States are born prematurely, or before the 37th week of pregnancy. This can result in medical complications for both mother and baby, developmental issues for the baby, and death. Obstetricians counsel women on how to prevent preterm birth, which includes advising them to seek regular prenatal care, manage their chronic conditions, limit their stress, and avoid risky substances, among other things. However, according to a recent study from Denmark doctors should also advise their patients to participate in regular exercise.
Researchers analyzed physical activity data from 87,232 participants from the Danish National Birth Cohort database and found that one third of the women reported participating in one to two hours of physical activity per week. The results of the study indicated that these physically active women had significantly lower preterm birth rates than women who did not exercise.
3
Exercise significantly changes heart's functioning and structure
It is a well known fact that exercise keeps the heart healthy and strong, however, until recently researchers did not know the exact cardiac changes that take place as a result of exercise.
In an effort to gain a better understanding of how exercise affects the heart over time, researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital and the Harvard University Health Services studied a group of athletes during one semester at Harvard University. Students were split into two groups, endurance, which consisted of 20 male and 20 female rowers and strength, which consisted of 35 male football players, all of whom were studied during their normal training sessions. After 90 days investigators found significant overall changes in the size of participants' hearts and relaxation of their hearts in between beats, although the types of changes were different for the two groups.
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Exercise reduces the risk of heart disease in obese women
Women who are overweight and obese are at increased risk for a variety of diseases, including heart disease. As the obesity rates in the United States continue to grow, so do incidences of heart disease, which means that each year a more and more women are suffering from strokes, heart attacks and other cardiac diseases. The good news is that exercise can help!
Researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center recently studied the effect of heart disease and obesity on a group of 39,000 women 45 years and older, 34 percent of which reported exercising for approximately 30 minutes, 5 days a week. At the end of the 11-year study, 948 of the women had some form of heart disease. Analysis of the data indicated that obese, inactive women were 2.53 percent more likely to have heart disease than normal weight women. However, obese and overweight women who exercised significantly reduced their risk for heart disease.
5
Sources
1Blanchard CM, et al. (2008). Cancer survivors' adherence to lifestyle behavior recommendations and associations with health-related quality of life: results from the American Cancer Society's SCS-II. Journal of Clinical Oncology, 26, 2198-204
2Moran A, et al. (2008). Changes in Insulin Resistance and Cardiovascular Risk During Adolescence. Establishment of Differential Risk in Males and Females. Circulation, epub
3Juhl M, et al. (2008). Physical exercise during pregnancy and the risk of preterm birth: a study within the Danish National Birth Cohort. American Journal of Epidemiology, 167, 859-66
4Baggish AL, et al. (2008). Training-specific changes in cardiac structure and function: a prospective and longitudinal assessment of competitive athletes. Journal of Applied Physiology, 104, 1121-8
5Weinstein AR, et al. (2008). The joint effects of physical activity and body mass index on coronary heart disease risk in women. Archives of Internal Medicine, 168, 884-90
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