Heart health has been on my mind lately, and I want to share some compelling new research about how much exercise you and I actually need to keep our heart’s blood vessels in good shape. The good news: you can take real steps to slow your heart’s aging, which in turn raises your odds of a long, healthy life. The catch? It requires exercise.
Last month, researchers published findings in the Journal of Physiology that pinpoint how many days per week you should work out to protect your arteries. These vessels grow stiffer with age, and as that happens, heart attack risk climbs. Because artery sizes vary from person to person, the study found that smaller arteries need fewer weekly exercise days than larger ones to stay healthy.
To limit stiffening in medium-sized arteries, two to three days a week of 30-minute workouts is enough. But for the equally important larger arteries, four to five days a week of exercise is needed to keep them flexible.
“This work is really exciting because it enables us to develop exercise programs to keep the heart youthful and even turn back time on older hearts and blood vessels,” one researcher said.
To reach these conclusions, the scientists studied 102 people, all over age 60, who had exercised throughout their lives. They first measured each participant’s artery stiffness, then sorted them into four groups based on lifelong exercise habits. One group exercised fewer than twice a week on average. Another consisted of “casual exercisers” active two to three times weekly. The remaining two groups worked out four to five times and six to seven times per week.
“A lifelong history of ‘casual exercise’ resulted in more youthful middle-sized arteries, which supply oxygenated blood to the head and neck,” the press release states. “However, people who exercised 4-5 times per week also had more youthful large central arteries, which provide blood to the chest and abdomen, in addition to healthier middle sized ones.”
The findings indicate that long-term exercise training can slow artery damage and heart aging. According to the researchers, the next step is to explore whether it might also reverse damage and aging in the cardiovascular system.
I’m Dr. Michael Hunter, and I appreciate you spending time here today! If you’d like to keep up with new posts, please consider subscribing below. Thank you.
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I hold degrees from Harvard, Yale and the University of Pennsylvania, and I practice radiation oncology in the Seattle area. A quick note: the advice here is meant to be general only. Please check with a trusted health professional before acting on it. Thank you!
