The research categorised activities that result in sweat, increased heart and breathing rates as vigorous
It is well known that people living with hypertension for a long time are vulnerable to cognitive decline. A new study has shown that vigorous physical activity (VPA) more than once a week can slow down that process.
The findings by researchers from Wake Forest University School of Medicine have been published online in Alzheimer’s & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer’s Association. “We know that physical exercise offers many benefits, including lowering blood pressure, improving heart health and potentially delaying cognitive decline,” said Richard Kazibwe, M.D., assistant professor of internal medicine at Wake Forest University School of Medicine and lead author of the study. “However, the amount and the intensity of exercise needed to preserve cognition is unknown.”
The study used data from the landmark Systolic Blood Pressure Intervention Trial (SPRINT) for the analysis.
SPRINT was a randomized, controlled, open-label trial that included 9361 nondiabetic U.S. adults at least 50 years of age, at high CVD risk, with hypertension and systolic blood pressure (SBP) between 130 and 180 mmHg at enrollment. It began in the fall of 2009 and included more than 9,300 participants with hypertension ages 50 and older, recruited from about 100 medical centers and clinical practices throughout the United States.
“Our findings show that individuals who reported engaging in VPA at a frequency of one or more sessions per week had a lower risk of MCI and probable dementia when compared to those who reported engaging in less than one session of VPA per week. Importantly, this association remained significant regardless of the intensity of SBP treatment. The results were also consistent across all the subgroups we included, with some heterogeneity by age and race for both MCI and probable dementia,” the researchers reported.
