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Exercise
& Preventing Disease
It
wasn't too long ago that people with conditions such as high blood
pressure, high blood sugar, arthritis, asthma and heart disease,
were told by Physicians to "take it easy","stay
in bed" or ingest several medications in order to stabilize
these conditions. Today, there is little doubt how the impact
of lifestyle changes, including exercise, can dramatically prevent,
treat and even cure many of these ailments.
Any
sustained movement, like walking, bicycling, swimming, or cross-country
skiing, will reduce the risk of several life-threatening diseases,
such as coronary heart disease, hypertension, diabetes, high cholesterol,
and possibly cancer. Exercise does not need to be boring, expensive,
time-consuming, or inconvenient. Moderate forms of exercise will
give the benefits needed to prevent disease. Gardening, dancing,
walking, household chores, and even shopping expeditions can give
you enough exercise to meet the daily requirement. All that's
needed to personalize your fitness plan is a creative and adventurous
spirit.
Exercise v.s. diet is often the debate that many health professionals
evaluate. By examining each disease through clinical trials, we
can better determine the efficacy of both exercise and diet in
the treatment of many common ailments. Diet, for example, is the
cornerstone of diabetes care, but if diet is combined with exercise,
diabetics dramatically improve their condition by more than 45%
than with diet alone.
"The problem
with our health today, is that people are just not moving enough.
You're talking about a dramatic decrease in our level of physical
activity from just 30 to 50 years ago. That's a relatively insignificant
amount of time for our bodies to adapt in comparison to the activity
levels we had evolved to before the technological era. This combined
with irresponsible eating habits is creating the health crisis you
see before you today."
For
people with chronic ailments, exercise used to be viewed as asking
for trouble. However, current evidence suggests that in both health
and disease, the overall prognosis is better for the exerciser than
for the sedentary. For example, a recent study showed that intensive
workouts can not only slow the progress of coronary disease, but
actually restore lost coronary function when the disease is still
stable.
"We've yet to find a disease state where exercise isn't helpful."
-Miriam Nelson, Ph.D, Tufts University.
Clinical trials indicate that exercise can help reduce
the pain and joint damage caused by arthritis, decrease attacks
and the need for medication in asthma sufferers, and ease anxiety
and depression. Other research 11indicates that regular workouts
may cut the risk of symptomatic gallstones by one-third. Exercise
has also recently be found to reduce the side effects of chemotherapy
and improve adherence to such treatment.
For chronically ill individuals, the psychological as well as physical
benefits of exercise can be profound. Even ten minutes of
light exercise a day, can help most chronically ill patients feel
more vibrant, energetic and alert.
"Exercise
is empowering and energizing, and it increases your sense of control
over the situation. You're never too sick or too old to get started
exercising."
-Bess Marcus, Ph.D, Brown's University
One of the most effective killers in North America
is cardiovascular disease. It is also a disease
which is so easily preventable through proper exercise and diet.
Out of a recent study conducted by Consumers Reports, almost 60%
of people who had heart conditions, reported that exercise and diet
(types of exercise and diet were not specified) helped them feel
much better. Hypertension, a common precursor
to cardiovascular disease is also directly influenced, treated and
prevented by supervised exercise and diet.
Studies still show that most doctors still fail to advise patients
about lifestyle changes to prevent and treat disease. Economic pressure
for briefer doctor visits, lack of formal training in nutrition,
exercise and lifestyle medicine, seem to underlie doctors' poor
performance in this area.
People with chronic medical problems should insist their health-care
providers give them information on how execise and lifestyle changes
can affect the course of a disease. If patients cannot obtain this
information from their doctors, they should find an appropriate
health professional who can.
The Chart below indicates the maximum improvement
for both diet and exercise for 6 common disorders,
based on well designed clinical trials. These lifestyle changes
can also lead to weight loss, which eases many of these disorders,
thus increasing the maximum improvement.
|
CONDITION
|
TYPE OF EXERCISE
|
MAXIMUM
IMPROVEMENT WITH EXERCISE
|
TYPE
OF DIET
|
MAXIMUM
IMPROVEMENT WITH DIET
|
|
High
Blood Pressure
|
Aerobic
|
 15% |
Low
fat, high produce, high dairy (low fat)
|
11%
|
|
High
LDL cholesterol
|
--
|
--
|
Low
saturated fat
|
20%
|
|
Low
HDL cholesterol
|
Aerobic
|
 15% |
--
|
--
|
|
High
Blood Sugar
|
Aerobic
|
15%
|
High
whole grain, high produce, limited calorie
|
30%
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|
Arthritis
Pain
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Strength
training, flexibility, low-impact aerobic
|
40%
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--
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--
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|
Low
Bone Density
|
Weight
bearing
|
3%
|
High
calcium (including supplements)
|
2%
|
Reference
Source 1,3,39,37,86
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