July 22, 2006
 
HEALTH: From Couch Potato to Carrot Stick
 
By Andre Picard
Toronto Globe and Mail
 
Are you a middle-aged couch potato?
 
Not to worry, because becoming physically active, even after 40, can still markedly reduce your risk of heart disease, according to a new study. The research, published in Wednesday's edition of the medical journal Heart, shows that, not surprisingly, people who are physically active all their lives are the least likely to develop cardiovascular disease.
 
By 65, active folks are about 60 percent less likely to develop heart disease than their sedentary counterparts, regardless of their other risk factors like smoking, diet and weight.
 
But people who get active in their middle age are not far behind. By 65, their risk of heart disease is 55 percent less than those who are sedentary, the new study found.
 
"Changing from a sedentary to a more physically active lifestyle, even in later adulthood, may strongly decrease coronary heart disease risk," said Dietrich Rothenbacher of the department of epidemiology of the German Center for Research on Aging at the University of Heidelberg in Heidelberg, Germany.
 
He said that while the benefits of physical activity are well established, most research looks at current activity levels.
 
To conduct their research, Rothenbacher and colleagues interviewed 312 adult patients suffering from heart disease and another 479 volunteers of similar age and background who did not suffer from cardiovascular disease.
 
They focused specifically on levels of physical activity in early adulthood, from 20 to 39, and in late adulthood, from 40 to 65.
 
A total of 10.6 percent of the heart patients and 6.3 percent of the control group reported being physically inactive throughout their adult lives -- meaning they did the equivalent of less than 30 minutes of walking daily. Fifty-six percent of the heart patients and 72 percent of the control group reported being moderately or very physically active throughout their adult years.
 
In an editorial also published in Heart, Dr. Goya Wannamethee of the department of primary care at Royal Free and University College Medical School in London, said the study is small but is consistent with other research that shows that taking up physical activity later in life is beneficial.
 
What is unclear, he said, is the type and level of activity that is most beneficial, but there is a growing body of literature suggesting that even moderate-intensity activity such as walking briskly confers significant benefits.
 
Wannamethee noted that the large majority of adults are sedentary, and that they tend to become more so with age.
 
Being inactive increases the risk not only of heart disease, but of stroke, diabetes and arthritis.
 
"Optimal benefit for coronary risk appears to be seen in people who undertake physical activity from an early age and maintain it through later adulthood," Wannamethee said.
 
"But for those who have been inactive for most of their adulthood, it is never too late to start," he says in the editorial.
 
Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, http://www.shns.com.