Just a few minutes of vigorous physical activity a day significantly reduces cancer risk
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Key takeaways:
- Daily bouts of vigorous physical activity for up to 1 minute appeared associated with a 20% reduction in total cancer incidence.
- Sharper reductions occurred in risk for physical activity-related cancers.
Small amounts of vigorous intermittent lifestyle physical activity appeared associated with lower risk for cancer, according to a study published in JAMA Oncology.
“Even though study participants were not doing any structured exercise, about 94% recorded some vigorous intermittent lifestyle physical activity; 92% was done in very short bursts lasting up to 1 minute,” Emmanuel Stamatakis, PhD, MSc, BSc, professor of physical activity, lifestyle and population health at the School of Health Sciences at The University of Sydney, told Healio. “A minimum dose of around 3.5 minutes per day was associated with a 17% to 18% reduction in total cancer risk compared with not doing any such activity.”
Background and methodology
Vigorous physical activity is a time-efficient way for people to achieve the recommended physical activity for cancer prevention, particularly those who view traditional exercise as unappealing or inaccessible.
Researchers evaluated the dose-response association between device-measured daily vigorous intermittent lifestyle physical activity (VILPA) and cancer incidence while estimating the minimal dose required for a risk reduction of 50% of the maximum reduction in cancer prevention.
The prospective cohort analysis included 22,398 self-reported nonexercising adults (mean age, 62 years; 54.8% women; 96% white) from the U.K. Biobank accelerometry subsample. Researchers measured daily VILPA of up to 1 and 2 minutes through accelerometers worn on the dominant wrist of participants.
Results
During a mean follow-up of 6.7 years, a total of 2,356 total incident cancer events occurred, with 1,084 being physical activity-related cancers. Researchers noted that 92.3% of VILPA occurred in bouts of up to 1 minute.
Daily VILPA duration appeared associated with outcomes in a near-linear manner, as dose-response curves appeared steeper for physical activity-related cancer incidence than total cancer incidence.
Median daily VILPA duration of bouts up to 1 minute (4.5 minutes/day), compared with no VILPA, had an HR of 0.8 (95% CI, 0.69-0.92) for total cancer incidence and an HR of 0.69 (95% CI, 0.55-0.86) for physical activity-related cancer incidence.
The minimal dose of 3.4 minutes/day had an HR of 0.83 (95% CI, 0.73-0.93) for total cancer incidence, while 3.7 minutes/day had an HR of 0.72 (95% CI, 0.59-0.88) for physical activity-related cancer incidence.
“For physical activity-related cancers, such as breast, lung and colorectal cancers, the dose response was stronger and the risk reduction sharper,” Stamatakis added. “At 4.5 minutes per day, physical activity-related cancer risk was reduced by 31% to 32%. For both total cancer and physical activity-related cancers, the results clearly show the age-old adage ‘the more the better’ also applies to doing with gusto day to day physical activity that makes you huff and puff.”
Next steps
The results showed physical activity to decrease risk for cancer incidence can be achieved without tremendous time and/or money dedicated to going to a traditional gym or purchasing traditional equipment, according to researchers.
However, further work is needed to better understand who may benefit most from this type of physical activity.
“For people who find it hard to initiate or adhere to an exercise program, our study suggests that doing a few short bursts of intense activity as the day goes by may be beneficial for long-term health. Examples of VILPA include 1- to 2-minute-long bursts of power walking, stair climbing, carrying heavy shopping, vigorous housework or energetic playing with the kids,” Stamatakis told Healio. “We have a large program of research on VILPA and other fine-grained physical activity patterns, or ‘micropatterns’ as we called it in a recent publication. Micropatterns of activity can only be picked up and quantified using wearable trackers; questionnaires cannot capture them. Considering that such activity was very much an under-the-radar affair for all previous questionnaire-based studies, we expect there is a lot of ground to cover in the next few years.
Future studies also will aim to determine whether VILPA effects differ by sex, how VILPA compares with exercise-based vigorous intensity activity, and the optimal length of incidental activity for health, he added.
In an accompanying editorial, Yvonne Wengström, OCN, PhD, a professor and nurse at Karolinska Institutet, and colleagues agreed that any form of physical activity, albeit small or not traditional exercise, still provides a health benefit.
“The conclusion as we see it, based on the findings of this study and others, is that most individuals benefit from being physically active, and the key is to make exercise a habit,” they wrote. “There are various types of physical activity, and numerous studies have demonstrated health benefits from most types of exercise. Moreover, it is rarely too late to start, and according to the findings of Stamatakis and colleagues, even brief sporadic vigorous physical activity may positively affect health and lower risk [for] disease. Any physical activity is better than none!”
References:
- Stamatakis E, et al. JAMA Oncol. 2023;doi:10.1001/jamaoncol.2023.1830.
- Wengström Y, et al. JAMA Oncol. 2023;doi:10.1001/jamaoncol.2023.1810.
For more information:
Emmanuel Stamatakis, PhD, MSc, BSc, can be reached at Charles Perkins Centre L6 West, Hub D17, The University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia; email: emmanuel.stamatakis@sydney.edu.au.
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