Lower Heart Failure Risk in Older Women With 3,600 Steps a Day
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For older women who could still walk around and who lived at home, higher amounts of ordinary daily light and moderate intensity activities were associated with a lower risk of heart failure, says the study’s lead author, Michael J. LaMonte, PhD, MPH, a research professor of epidemiology and environmental health at the State University of New York in Buffalo School of Public Health and Health Professions.
“For women who are able, getting 3,600 steps is a reasonable target that would be consistent with the amount of daily activity performed by women in this study,” says Dr. LaMonte. Three thousand steps is the equivalent of about a mile and a half.
These findings show that physical activity is an important component of a healthy lifestyle, says Mercedes Carnethon, PhD, the vice chair of the department of preventive medicine and a professor of epidemiology and pulmonary and critical care medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago.
“To know that a behavior that is under one’s control — how much they exercise and the extent to which they can reduce their time spent sitting — can have such powerful benefits in preventing heart failure is a major advance in our field,” says Dr. Carnethon, who was not involved in the study.
About 1 in 4 People Will Develop Heart Failure in Their Lifetime
There are two types of heart failure: reduced ejection fraction and preserved ejection fraction. In heart failure with reduced ejection fraction, the left ventricle, which is the principal cardiac pump, doesn’t contract sufficiently when pumping blood outward. In heart failure with preserved ejection fraction, the left ventricle doesn’t relax properly after contracting.
Even Light Housework Reduced Heart Failure Risk
Researchers aimed to evaluate the impact of steps per day, light intensity activity, and time spent sitting on heart failure risk among women between 63 and 99 years old. The nearly 6,000 women had an average age of 79 and were 49 percent white, 34 percent Black, and 17 percent Hispanic, without known heart failure at baseline. Participants were enrolled from March 2012 to April 2014, and for seven consecutive days they wore an accelerometer on their hip.
The women were active a little more than 5.5 hours per day (340 minutes) on average, and 85 percent of that activity was light intensity — things like unloading the dishwasher or blow drying hair. They spent an average of 10 hours and 20 minutes a day sitting.
On the basis of their activity level, women were placed into four groups:
- Less than 276 active minutes and less than 2,164 steps
- 276 to 336 minutes and between 2,164 and 3,210 steps
- 337 to 397 minutes and between 3,211 and 4,541 steps
- More than 397 minutes and more than 4,541 steps
During an average follow-up of 7.5 years, researchers observed 407 cases of heart failure; 257 were preserved ejection fraction and 110 were reduced ejection fraction.
Not only did the women who walked just a little more than average lower their heart failure risk, but for each 70 minutes per day spent in light intensity physical activity, like household chores, participants were 12 percent less likely to develop heart failure. For every 30 minutes of more vigorous intensity activity (things like walking and climbing the stairs) the risk of heart failure fell by 16 percent.
Sitting more was associated with higher heart failure risk. Each hour and a half of sedentary time was associated with a 17 percent higher risk of heart failure.
These findings are unique and important given that there is very little published data on physical activity and preserved ejection fraction. Other studies can use this information to build on prevention efforts, says LaMonte.
“And given that there are very few effective treatments, preventing this type of heart failure, preserved ejection fraction, is especially important. Instead of waiting and trying to treat it effectively after it happens, preventing it all together becomes a better option,” he says.
Still Trying (and Failing) to Get 10,000 Steps a Day? Let It Go
The good news is that just a few more steps each day and a little less sitting make a big difference in health outcomes, especially for people who move very little, says LaMonte.
He says that “steps per day” is easily understood and can be measured by a variety of consumer-level wearable devices that allow people to monitor their physical activity. You don’t have to be tech savvy.
“Finding that around 3,000 steps per day — steps that came primarily from usual daily activities, doing stuff around their home with maybe a little bit of deliberate walking — was associated with a 26 percent lower risk of having heart failure, that’s a remarkable finding. And it’s far, far less than the 10,000 step per day marker that has been promoted for many years — which, oddly enough, doesn’t have a whole lot of science behind it,” he says.
Study Provides More Evidence That Lower Step Counts Still Have Big Health Benefits
“We should forget about the magical number of 7,000 to 10,000 steps to have health benefits. We know now that even about 4,000 steps and more might be associated with significant mortality reduction,” said the lead author of that meta-analysis, Maciej Banach, MD, PhD, an adjunct professor at Ciccarone Center for the Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, in a previous interview with Everyday Health.
Could Men Also Lower Their Heart Failure Risk Through More Light Activity and Walking?
Bottom Line: Forget 10,000 Steps; Just Reduce Sitting Time and Move More
“It’s a simple message: A growing body of evidence supports sitting less and moving more,” says LaMonte. Next to quitting smoking, physical activity is the lifestyle intervention that probably provides the most heart-health benefits, he adds.
That doesn’t mean you have to get 10,000 steps or exercise 150 to 300 minutes a week to reap the health rewards, he says. “Some people have gotten the message that you have to achieve these benchmarks to get any benefits, and that’s not true. That’s not how the body works. Just getting off the couch has benefits; trying to up your activity level by a little bit here and there has benefits,” says LaMonte.
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