021212 Movement and your heart health

Movement and heart health

Your heart’s abilities to function start diminishing with age. We all know this but the vast majority of our population still refuses to do anything about it. Aging adversely affects the communication capability of the regulatory nerves in the heart telling it how fast to beat. Gradually, as we age, our maximum heart rate (MHR) declines.

However, with regular exercise this typical transformation in max heart rate is less noticeable.

Not only does the MHR decline with age but the ability of the heart to relax and fill up again decreases as well. This is especially true for those with hypertension.

In addition, as we get older, the major blood vessels of our body lose some of their natural elasticity. This in turn makes it more difficult for the blood to pass through them, thereby increasing the load on the heart and making it harder to transfer oxygen throughout the body.

The good news is age related changes such as these are less dramatic with daily exercise. The U. S. Department of Health and Human Services recommends the following activity levels for adults up to age sixty-four.

We all know that a little bit of activity is better than nothing, however, if you’ve been in active for any length of time be better for you to gradually increase the level of activity. This can mean that as little as 10 minutes a day of moderate exercise will garner health benefits. After you’ve been at it a while this this length of time is going to feel easy.

The benefits to your health increase with higher intensity activities. Again, 10 minutes of time exercising is the minimum amount necessary to push up your fitness levels. In the case of higher intensity vigorous exercise, you will need at least one hundred and fifty minutes a week at a level where you can only say a few words at a time without stopping for a breath.

Up to a point, higher amounts of activity will produce the most in health benefits. In fact, the literature states unequivocally that exercising 6 to 7 hours a week will result in the ideal level of health benefits for the majority of the population. At this level of activity per week, you are probably going to be doing six or seven hours of moderate to vigorous intensities of exercise.