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25.09.2022

How the combination of vigorous exercise and moderate-intensity exercise can extend life span

Exercise can make you live longer. This has everything to do with the advice of health experts to be physically active for at least half an hour to an hour every day. If you move twice more than that norm, your chance of dying decreases even further. Moreover, it does not matter whether you exercise intensively or moderately-intensively.

Study
Harvard University epidemiologists pooled data from 2 large studies that involved a total of 116,221 highly skilled medical professionals. The loyal readers of the website have already guessed which studies are involved. This concerns data from the Nurses' Health Study and the Health Professionals Follow-up Study. Of course.

The Harvardians were able to follow their study participants from 1988 to 2018. During this period, 47,596 study participants died. The researchers knew approximately how much and how intensively the study participants exercised in their spare time.

Results
As the study participants were more physically active, their risk of death was lower. This applied to both intensive and moderately intensive forms of exercise. It should be noted, however, that the researchers did not have as many study participants with excessive physical activity.

Health experts believe that everyone should do 30-60 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise 5 times a week. Those who comply with this guideline reduce their risk of death by 19-25 percent compared to someone who is not physically active at all.

If you exercise 2 times more than this guideline, the reduction in the risk of death is 2-4 percent more. If you move 4 times more than the guideline, we are talking about an extra reduction of 3-13 percent. In both cases, this extra reduction is in addition to the reduction of 19-25 percent mentioned earlier.

Below, the researchers have summarized the effect of different combinations of exercise on the risk of death. Click on the figure for a larger version.

The figure shows that people who exercise intensively for 150-300 minutes a week extend their lifespan to the maximum. This amounts to 5 intensive training sessions of 30-60 minutes per week.

The figure shows that people who exercise intensively for 150-300 minutes a week extend their lifespan to the maximum. This amounts to 5 intensive training sessions of 30-60 minutes per week.

A lifestyle in which people exercise moderately intensively for 300-600 hours minutes per week has the same effect. This equates to 5 walks of 1-2 hours per week.

The researchers were unable to demonstrate that even more exercise leads to a further reduction in mortality or, if you put it differently, a further extension of the possible lifespan. However, the researchers found that people who don't get the optimal amount of exercise of one type can compensate with exercise of the other type.

For example, if you exercise for 30-60 minutes 3 times a week and walk for 1-2 hours 2 times a week, you have also given yourself an optimal dose of exercise.

Source:
Br J Sports Med. 2022 Aug;56(16):919-26.

More:
Men who want to live longer should exercise more 19.12.2021
Physical activity as a longevity drug | More is better 01.09.2019
An active lifestyle doubles the chance that you will still be perfectly healthy 10 years from now 07.08.2018
Lifestyle with lots of exercise makes you nine years younger 08.08.2017

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Longevity

Half an hour exercise a day? Make that three hours... We hear from scientists and health officers that we should all get at least half an hour of exercise a day to stay healthy. And if you already do that you should try to make that half hour a whole hour.	Intensive exercise is healthier Exercise is even healthier if about a quarter to a third of the total amount of activity you get is made up of intensive exercise.	Do intensive exercise instead of moderately intensive exercise and live longer If you replace half an hour of sitting with half an hour of physical activity every day you'll live longer. Replacing half an hour of light physical activity with intensive activity has the same effect.