MONDAY, May 7 (HealthDay News) -- Exercise can slow muscle
wasting, boost strength and reduce inflammation caused by aging and
heart failure, a new study confirms.
In heart failure -- also called congestive heart failure -- the
heart doesn't pump blood well enough to meet the body's needs.
About 5.7 million adult Americans have heart failure, according to
the American Heart Association.
One expert not connected with the study said interventions that
work are needed.
"Heart failure, which is a debilitating, chronic condition often associated with multiple hospitalizations, and is a financial burden on our health care system, may improve with exercise," said Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum, preventive cardiologist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. "Recommendations to treat heart failure should clearly include an exercise component, as the benefits are those that can help improve the clinical status in these otherwise sick patients," she said.
The new study included 60 heart failure patients and 60 healthy
people who did either four weeks of supervised aerobic training or
no exercise. Half of the participants were 55 and younger and half
were 65 and older.
The exercise group undertook four 20-minute training sessions
per day, five days a week. They also did one 60-minute group
exercise session that focused on muscle endurance and oxygen uptake
(a measure of aerobic endurance).
Among heart failure patients who exercised, those aged 55 and
younger increased their peak oxygen uptake by 25 percent and those
aged 65 and older increased it by 27 percent.
According to Steinbaum, those finding demonstrate that "these
beneficial effects [of exercise] are not age-dependent."
The study also found that the exercise program slowed muscle
wasting in the heart failure patients and improved their leg muscle
strength and overall exercise capacity, regardless of age.
The findings suggest that exercise benefits even elderly heart
failure patients, the researchers said.
The study appears May 7 in the journal
Circulation.
"Many physicians -- and insurance companies -- still believe that cardiac rehabilitation does not really help in old age. This study clearly falsifies this belief," lead co-author Dr. Stephan Gielen, deputy director of cardiology at the University Hospital, Martin Luther University of Halle, Germany, said in a journal news release.
"Exercise switches off the muscle-wasting pathways and switches on pathways involved in muscle growth, counteracting muscle loss and exercise intolerance in heart failure patients," he explained.
More information
The U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute has more
about
heart failure.