March 1, 2023 – A brief walk every single day or an extended walk once every week is enough to cut back the chance of heart attack, stroke or cancer, recent research shows.
Those who exercise 75 minutes every week reduce the chance of heart disease by 17% and the chance of cancer by 7%, in line with the studythis week in British Journal of Sports Medicine. The time required is 10 to 11 minutes per day.
More exercise provided even greater protection. 150 minutes of exercise per week reduced the chance of early death from any cause by 16%. The exercise intensity for the study was corresponding to a brisk walk.
“We know that physical activity like walking or cycling is good for you, especially if you feel it increases your heart rate. But we have found that there are significant benefits for heart health and reducing your cancer risk, even if you can only do 10 minutes a day,” said researcher Dr. James Woodcock in a opinion.
The researchers from the University of Cambridge within the UK who conducted the study desired to learn how much exercise is required to attain a meaningful health profit. They pooled data from 94 previous studies on the subject and analyzed the combined data from greater than 30 million participants.
Sometimes two research studies on the identical topic provide conflicting advice, the researchers noted. Combining such numerous studies improves the knowledge of the statistical evaluation because more data is offered and the larger study can smooth out conflicting results from smaller studies.
In this latest evaluation, researchers found that not less than 75 minutes of weekly exercise was particularly protective against certain sorts of cancer, reducing the chance of head and neck cancer, myeloid leukemia, myeloma and gastrointestinal cancer by 14 to 26 percent. They also calculated that about one in six early deaths might have been prevented if each study participant had exercised not less than 150 minutes weekly, or one in 10 deaths with just 75 minutes per week.
“If you are someone who finds the idea of 150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity per week a little daunting, then our findings should be good news for you,” said researcher Dr. Søren Brage. “A little physical activity is better than none. This is also a good starting point – if you find that 75 minutes per week is doable, you can try to gradually increase the activity to the full recommended amount.”