Targeting increased physical activity may help reproductive-aged women lower diabetes risk
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Reproductive-aged women who had previous gestational diabetes or prediabetes were less likely to meet physical activity goals, particularly muscle strengthening activity, than their peers at lower diabetes risk, according to study data.
Bethany G. Rand, MSc, a doctoral student in public health, exercise science cognate at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and colleagues examined the link between diabetes risk status and meeting HHS recommendations for aerobic activity, muscle strengthening activity and both. They included 211,114 nonpregnant women aged 18 to 44 years without diabetes who participated in the 2011, 2013, 2015 or 2017 U.S. Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System survey. Researchers grouped patients as either no diabetes (n = 202,766) or at risk for diabetes (n = 8,348).
Compared with women with no diabetes, those in the group at risk for diabetes were less likely to meet recommendations for aerobic activity (OR = 0.95; 95% CI, 0.91-0.98) and muscle strengthening activity (OR = 0.83; 95% CI, 0.75-0.92) individually and together (OR = 0.87; 95% CI, 0.78-0.97).
After testing for effect modification, researchers observed interactions for BMI in models involving recommendations for meeting muscle strengthening activity (P = .1), both types of physical activity (P = .07) and neither type (P = .005), but not for aerobic activity alone (P = .62).
Data indicated that women in the group at risk for diabetes were less likely to meet muscle strengthening activity recommendations than the group without diabetes, whether they had normal BMI (OR = 0.69; 95% CI, 0.58-0.81) or overweight (OR = 0.78; 95% CI, 0.65-0.93). Additionally, women at risk for diabetes who had a normal BMI had lower odds of meeting both recommendations (OR = 0.76; 95% CI, 0.63-0.91) compared with women without diabetes.
Likelihood of achieving physical activity recommendations did not differ by diabetes status for women with obesity.
“This study is novel in its focus on reproductive-aged women in the United States at risk for diabetes who stand to benefit from increasing physical activity, particularly muscle strengthening activity,” Rand and colleagues concluded. “As evidence suggests muscle strengthening activity may improve glucose regulation, and meeting the muscle strengthening activity recommendation was rare in this study and other studies of pregnant women, older women and mixed ages. Our study highlights an opportunity for diabetes risk reduction in women of a reproductive age, which could impact the quality of life of women and their families, the economic burden of diabetes and the health of future generations.”
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