Daily exercise at age 70 may help prevent heart disease later
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Exercising for at least 20 minutes daily at age 70 years was associated with reduced risk for CV outcomes later in life, researchers reported in Heart.
The effect was most prominent in men and lessened at age 75, 80 and 85 years, according to the researchers.
Claudio Barbiellini Amidei, MD, preventive medicine specialist in the department of cardio-thoraco-vascular sciences and public health at the University of Padua in Padova, Italy, and colleagues analyzed 2,754 participants aged at least 65 years (mean age, 75 years; 60% women) from the Progetto Veneto Anziani cohort study.
The participants were stratified into the following categories based on physical activity: stable-low, low-increasing, high-decreasing and stable-high. Those who exercised at least 20 minutes per day were categorized as physically active.
The outcome of interest was prevalent and incident CVD, including CHD, HF and stroke.
Rates of incident CHD and HF were lower throughout the study period for physically active men and women compared with those who were not physically active, the researchers wrote.
In a fully adjusted model, physical activity was associated with reduced risk for CVD (adjusted HR = 0.74; 95% CI, 0.58-0.94), CHD (aHR = 0.66; 95% CI, 0.5-0.87) and HF (aHR = 0.72; 95% CI, 0.53-0.98) in men, but not in women, according to the researchers.
In addition, physical activity was associated with reduced risk for all-cause mortality in men (aHR = 0.72; 95% CI, 0.62-0.84) and women (aHR = 0.81; 95% CI, 0.72-0.92), Amidei and colleagues found.
In an analysis by age, physical activity in men was associated with reduced risk for CVD at age 70 years (aHR = 0.58; 95% CI, 0.39-0.84), but the association was attenuated at age 75 years (aHR = 0.74; 95% CI, 0.52-1.05) and not present at all at age 80 and 85 years.
In men, reduced risk for CVD (P for trend = .002), CHD (P for trend = .005) and HF (P for trend = .038) progressively improved from the stable-low group to the stable-high group, Amidei and colleagues wrote.
There was no relationship between physical activity and stroke risk. Adding prevalent cases of CVD at baseline did not change the results.
“When stratifying by age, we found that the association between physical activity and cardiovascular risk was significantly reduced among participants aged 70 years, and with marginal significance at 75 years, while no association was found among the oldest age groups, suggesting greater cardiovascular benefits might be achieved by improving physical activity earlier in late life,” the researchers wrote.
In a related editorial, Enrico Fabris, MD, and Gianfranco Sinagra, MD, both from the University of Trieste, Italy, wrote: “This study reveals important concepts: the persistence of an active life, or an increasing level of physical activity in older people may improve prognosis; however, this potential benefit is mostly evident when an active lifestyle is present early in late life.”
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