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New research examines the potential impact of strength training on the development of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease .
WORDS : ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR MIKE CLIMSTEIN & JOE WALSH
Title : Strength Training and the Risk of Type 2 Diabetes and Cardiovascular Disease . Authors : Dr ’ s Shiroma and colleagues . ( National Institutes of Health , National Institute on Aging , Maryland , USA ) Source : Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise . 49 ( 1 ): 40-46 ( 2017 ).
Introduction : One thing that I like about seeing patients with a wide variety of chronic diseases or disorders is that it never gets boring . You may see 1,000 individuals with ( for example ) osteoporosis each year , yet every one of them is different . Students always ask ‘ do you memorise the exercise guidelines for each of the disorders or do you have them stored somewhere ?’ This is quite a reasonable question , and the answer is yes and yes . You can ’ t help but commit the guidelines to memory , but as they are ‘ living guidelines ’ they are continually updated , and it ’ s no small task to keep abreast of them . So , despite my brilliant memory … I still keep an electronic copy of the most recent exercise prescription guidelines in my DropBox for easy access , each in a folder specific to the disease / disorder . Hell of a good system ( in my humble opinion ).
Another common question from students is ‘ do you prescribe the same exercise prescription for every patient with the same disease ?’ This time the answer is yes – and no . The guidelines provide the base of the exercise prescription , however for best practice I need to take into account any limitations each patient may have . For example , the majority of patients I see with osteoporosis are generally older ( 50 years and over ) and female . But regardless of gender , an osteoporosis patient ’ s exercise prescription will focus upon weight bearing exercises , falls prevention exercise / training and enquiry into their vitamin D and calcium intake ( the latter to ensure they are meeting the International Osteoporosis Foundation guidelines ). Yes , I do this for every patient . When dealing with the mature-aged patient , you also have to appreciate the presence of co-morbidities ( the presence of additional diseases or disorders ).
But what ‘ protection ’ is afforded from resistance training for other co-morbidities , such as cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes mellitus ? This is the question Dr Shiroma and his colleagues investigated using data from the Women ’ s Health Study , a large-scale study from Harvard Medical School which used annual questionnaires to investigate women ’ s health in more than 35,000 women annually from 1992 to 2004 and then afterwards in an ongoing observational study . The purpose of the study was to advance the knowledge about prevention of cardiovascular disease , cancer and other diseases in women . For this study , the researchers were interested in the association between strength training and the incidence of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease risk .
Methods : Dr Shiroma and his colleagues assessed the health of approximately 36,000 healthy women ( average age 62 ) who completed an initial questionnaire in 2000 and then one per year until the final questionnaire in 2014 . For this particular study , they were interested to see how many active women developed type 2 diabetes and / or cardiovascular disease . They defined cardiovascular disease as cases of either myocardial infarction , stroke , having undergone coronary artery bypass surgery , angioplasty or death ( attributed to
The 30-second article
• A large scale longitudinal study investigated the association between strength training and the incidence of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease risk in women
• The effect on incidence of diabetes and cardiovascular disease of strength training , aerobic exercise and a combination of the two was gauged
• Both strength training and aerobic exercise were found to independently have very significant positive health associations
• A combination of strength and aerobic work was associated with the most positive health outcomes .
28 | NETWORK WINTER 2017