Lose weight and don’t need a treadmill

According to a Wake Forest University study published online today in the peer-reviewed journal Obesity, teaching older people how to stay on the move after significant weight loss does not necessarily require structured training. ..

In the study “Exercise to Maintain Weight Loss in the Elderly and Intervention in All-day Exercise,” 183 men and women aged 65-85 underwent a 6-month dietary weight loss and physical activity regimen. .. -Go through the maintenance phase in 18 months. Study participants who were classified as obese based on the classification of obesity index were all offered the same diet, but were divided into three groups for activity guidance.

• In addition to weight loss, structured exercise such as treadmill training.
• In addition to weight loss, what researchers call the SitLess intervention. It encourages people to accumulate activities throughout the day by doing things they enjoy, such as walking dogs and gardening.
• A combination of weight loss, structured exercise and SitLess.

All three groups lost the same amount of weight in the first 6 months (average 8.2 kg or just over 18 pounds), but the group instructed to keep moving all day was more in 18 months. I kept my weight down.

In fact, the group following the weight loss and exercise-only regimen recovered most at £ 11 (5.2 kg) and above, while the group focused on weight loss and SitLess recovered most at around £ 5 (2.4 kg). did not. ).

Jason Fanning, a scholar at the Wells Fargo School of Health and Exercise Sciences at Wake Forest University, turns it into a “painless, no benefit” mindset about weight loss and head movements. The lead author of the obesity paper, he helped design the SitLess program and developed a smartphone app that research participants can use to monitor their daily activities and check in to coaches and other research participants. ..

“We found that traveling all day to reach our daily activity goals was as effective in supporting weight loss as structured exercise and suitable for controlling that weight.” He said. “Find time to add activities many times a day and try to find many activities that you are enjoying.”

The SitLess protocol was developed by W. Jack Rejeski and Barb Nicklas of Wake Forest, the principal investigators of the research underlying the current paper. Empower with movements to prevent obesity and weight recovery (EMPOWER).. Rejeski is Thurman D from the Faculty of Health and Exercise Science. Professor Kitchin and Nicklas is a professor of gerontology and geriatrics at the Wake Forest School of Medicine. Both are co-authors of obesity papers.

Given that studies have shown that people who lose weight usually recover more than half of their weight after 2 years and more than 80% after 5 years, the results of the SitLess intervention show that healthcare providers are older patients. It can have a significant impact on how you teach. Drop the pound.

Fanning, who has been involved in multiple studies focused on helping older people lose weight through the Claude Pepper Older Americans Independence Center at Wakeforest School of Medicine, said there are many reasons for weight recovery. .. Not everyone likes structured training, so they drop them after the first push to lose weight. From time to time, people who start a structured exercise program may stop doing previous activities, such as walking a dog, and not regain them after weight loss. And many don’t think these little activities, such as cleaning the floor or climbing stairs instead of elevators, can make a difference in weight loss, even if it’s hours of activity each day. ..

“Most of the messages are exercise, exercise, exercise,” Fanning said. “I want people to see that there are benefits to accumulating movement throughout the day, and in some cases even greater, than focusing solely on structured exercise. increase.”

This is the key to the next step in the EMPOWER survey. The research team is looking at ways to retrain people’s perceptions and adopt day-to-day movements. They also test whether diet-based weight loss and exercise programs work remotely. This is an experiment partly inspired by a pandemic. And they hope that future research will determine how the SitLess protocol can help people of different ages and conditions, such as diabetes, cognitive decline, and cardiovascular disease. ..

“I want to see a future where people are encouraged to move in most aspects of life,” Fanning said. “It affects most chronic illnesses and makes us happy.”