Study shows those who exercised were more likely to be eventually discharged from the hospital than those who didn't.

“Is it all worth it?”

An older gentleman friend of mine said this to me at the gym today, wondering whether all the effort he’s put in at the gym over the years will amount to anything.

Joe is a bit overweight, so this is no doubt the reason why he left the gym sounding defeated with his exercise excursion.  It’s too bad he can’t see the big picture, as he doesn’t have any diseases or illnesses to speak of, and he’s well into his 70s!

But even if he were bedridden or had to be admitted to a hospital for some serious condition, the effects of exercising while there would increase his chances of improving tremendously.  You don’t have to take my word for it, though; a recent study published online says so as well.

The study was conducted by doctors from the University of Chicago, and it involved patients who were bedridden, or more specifically, critically ill to the point of needing sedation in the Intensive Care Unit.

While the 104 people’s conditions involved in the study was serious enough that they required ventilators, they were healthy enough to be taken off the ventilators for limited amounts of time.

It was under these conditions that doctors had some of the patients participate in light physical therapy, where 49 of them were able to get up and move around.  The others remain lying in bed, receiving the standard treatment for their condition.

After several weeks of this, the researchers came away with some amazing findings that would send shivers down the spine of my good friend Joe.  They found that approximately 60 percent of those who participated in the physical therapy aspect of rehabilitation achieved what the researchers refer to as “independent functional status.”  They defined this as the ability to walk without any need of assistance and able to perform six different tasks of daily living.

Further, those who exercised were more likely to be eventually discharged from the hospital, had more days in which they were off their ventilators entirely, and more likely to have days without any confusion or delirium-related issues (neurological episodes are common among people sedated for long period of time in Intensive Care Units, according to the study).

Comparatively, 35 percent of those who received the standard care without the physical therapy eventually achieved “independent functional status.”  A fair number of people, sure, but clearly not as high as those who were given exercise daily.

The results were compelling and robust enough for researchers from Switzerland to chime in with their own commentary on the subject in the journal where the study was published, The Lancet , saying that physical therapy ought to be a prescribed treatment for all people submitted to an ICU.

Heaven forbid my friend Joe needs to be admitted to an ICU, but I’m hoping he gets a chance to read this study.  Perhaps then he’ll realize the exercise he’s doing is keeping him out of the ICU…and can help get him out of the ICU should he ever be admitted.

Source:
health.msn.com

I can honestly say that some of the most together and articulate senior citizens I know are those I’ve met through my health club.  You name the cliché – “with it,” “on the ball,” “sharp as a tack,” you name it – their mental prowess is something special.

It’s no coincidence that this is the case, for the brain actually increases in size and ability depending on that person’s physical fitness.

This is according to researchers from the Universities of Chicago and Pittsburgh, who performed brain scans on the hippocampus region of senior citizen participants.  The motley crew of participants (ages ranged between 59 and 81, so many of them did not meet the standard definition of senior citizen) also went through a slew of physical fitness tests that gauged just HOW fit they were. 

Here’s what they found:  the fittest of the flock had the largest brains, purely from a physical standpoint.  But it wasn’t just that their brains were bigger – their brains functioned better.  Specifically, they were better at spatial reasoning.  Spatial reasoning is a high falutin’ phrase doctors use that in layman’s terms refers to one’s ability to recognize repeating patterns, similarities and differences between two or more things, objects or people.  The part of the brain where spatial reasoning takes place is in the hippocampus, which also happens to be the portion of the brain that’s most adversely affected by Alzheimer’s disease and other memory-related issues.

This is a truly amazing discovery that ought to embolden each and every one of us to strive to continue exercising throughout our lives.  Rarely do we consider how often we use spacial reasoning skills, but we use them all the time, hundreds if not thousands of times a day:  from deciphering what food is what, what face belongs to what name, and where we left our set of keys or pair of reading glasses (and which ones are ours).  Through exercise, we can maintain our spacial reasoning skills for the balance of our lives. 

Art Kramer, a psychology professor at the University of Illinois and co-author of the study, made the following observation about his study that really struck a chord with me:  “Here is yet more evidence that becoming fit has implications for how well you’re going to live your life.”

It’s not a profound statement by any means, but a statement that sort of summarizes the whole point to why exercise every day is so important:  it determines how WELL our lives will be lived today, tomorrow, and years down the road.  Keep that in mind on those days when you’ve hit a wall in your enthusiasm for exercise.  Those days happen; all of us tend to get burnt down by monotonous tasks (and let’s be honest, exercise can get monotonous, even when you change your routine).  The trick is to fight through that wall, and recognize that what you’re doing has virtually no downside.  Exercise is all upside:  an upside that adds years to your physical vivacity and mental longevity. 

Source:
Science Daily