Individuals finding means to get rid of fats without depending on drugs and hampering diet have received some good news. Investigators from the Northwestern Medicine assert that moderate to vigorous activity almost every day of the week from youth itself helps people gain extremely less weight by middle age. Women seem to benefit considerably by high activity in later life.
Over a period of 20 years, women reported a gain of less than 13 pounds than those with low activity. On the other hand, men with high activity possibly achieved about 6 pounds less than those with low-activity. Under high activity, recreational exercise like basketball, running, brisk walking or an exercise class or daily activities such as housework or construction work were included. High activity supposedly has a greater effect in women. Men in the high-activity group were made to eat more as compared to than their low-activity counterparts. Scientists predict that eating more led to excess weight gain. Women who were highly active didn’t eat more than low-activity women throughout the study.
Stephen Sidney, MD, associate director for clinical research at the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research and coauthor, said, “This paper is another example of how the CARDIA study has contributed to our knowledge about the importance of initiating healthy habits early in life and vigilantly maintaining them. Common medical problems such as heart disease, diabetes, and obesity have their origins in childhood and can generally be prevented by maintaining a normal weight, not smoking, exercising regularly and eating a healthy diet throughout life.â€
The study initiated on 1,800 women and 1,700 men measured impact of high activity over 20 years between young adulthood and middle age. Participants were also subjected to frequent examinations for analyzing the impact of a single exercise intervention on weight for a short period of time. Activity level in youth may control metabolic rate and hence, regular activity can help reduce weight in middle age. Lower level of activity apparently has negligible effect on weight gain.
The study was published December 14 in the Journal of the American Medical Association.