Healthy Aging: Why Exercise is Essential
Regular exercise is an essential component of healthy aging, helping seniors maintain independence and improve their physical and mental health. Exercise has numerous benefits for older adults, including improving muscle strength, building bone density, enhancing mobility and balance, and slowing age-related cognitive decline. Experts recommend that older adults engage in moderate-intensity aerobic exercise 150 minutes a week, strength train twice a week, and engage in weekly balance and flexibility training.
Regular exercise is extremely beneficial for older adults, helping seniors maintain independence and improve physical and mental health. As we age, we naturally experience reductions in muscle mass and bone mineral density, loss of elasticity in connective tissue, and a decline in balance and coordination skills. However, regular exercise, including aerobic, strength, flexibility, and balance training, can minimize these declines and in fact, improve muscle strength, bone density, and overall balance and fitness.
Physical benefits of exercise for seniors include:
Improved energy: Exercise promotes the release of endorphins which combat stress hormones, mitigate pain, and provide a sense of well-being and a feeling of more energy.
Reduce impact and risk of illness and chronic disease: Those who exercise have improved blood pressure and digestion. Research has shown that exercise lowers the risk of diabetes, obesity, hypertension, heart disease, osteoporosis, Alzheimer’s disease, and certain cancers.
Enhances mobility and balance: Exercise reduces the risk of falling by building greater strength in the lower extremity and core to provide stability as you move.
Builds bone density: Weight-bearing aerobic exercise and strength training place stress on the bones through movement, causing the bone to become stronger in response.
Relieves osteoarthritis pain: Exercise helps lessen pain and stiffness from arthritis by improving the lubrication around joints. Exercise also takes the pressure off aching joints by strengthening the surrounding muscles.
Increases muscle mass: Resistance training requires our muscles to contract to lift an object against the pull of gravity, building muscle mass and strength through repetitive resistance training.
Boosts immunity: In 2018, a study linked moderate exercise with a lower incidence of acute respiratory illness and fewer sick days off work. Experts propose that exercise can improve the performance of immune cells and that the anti-inflammatory effect of physical activity enables better immune function.
Mental health benefits of exercise for seniors include:
Improves sleep: Exercise can improve your sleep as the energy depletion that occurs when physically active stimulates recuperative processes during sleep. After exercising, you can fall asleep faster, sleep more deeply, and wake feeling more refreshed and energized.
Enhances brain function: Exercise stimulates the body to release proteins and other chemicals that improve the structure and function of the brain and enhance the growth of brain cells. Exercise can sharpen your thinking, learning, and judgment skills and enhance your focus and cognitive skills.
Boosts mood: Exercise can reduce anxiety, depression, and stress. While exercising, endorphins are released which help to reduce pain and boost pleasure, giving a general feeling of well-being. Exercise increases concentrations of norepinephrine (a chemical in your brain that helps moderate the brain’s response to stress), which eases feelings of depression and anxiety.
Slows age-related cognitive decline: Research has shown that exercise can reduce the risk of and help slow the progression of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. One study in older adults showed that exercise can impact and grow the hippocampus, which is important for memory and learning.Exercise also helps improve the health and function of synapses between neurons in the brain, allowing brain cells to better communicate.
For older adults, experts recommend that they engage in moderate-intensity aerobic exercise at least 30 minutes a day, five times a week as well as strength training twice a week and weekly flexibility and balance training. It is advised that seniors check with their doctor before engaging in an exercise plan. The doctor may advise the individual to begin an exercise program with a qualified physical therapist who will begin by assessing the senior’s baseline functional abilities and customize an exercise program from there.
A balanced senior exercise program should include:
Aerobic exercise: aerobic exercise requires the use of large muscle groups, which increases blood flow and places a demand on the heart and lungs. It boosts cardiovascular function, strengthens the lungs, and improves everyday stamina. Through cardio, when this demand is repeated on the muscles, heart, and lungs, the body adapts by increasing its capacity to tolerate the added load, increasing endurance. Recommended aerobic exercises for seniors include walking, swimming, hiking, cycling, rowing, dancing, or tennis.
Strength training: strength training builds muscle through repetitive movements that isolate the muscle groups to strengthen them using weights, resistance bands, or body weight. Strength training should target large muscle groups in the arms, back, and legs as well as the core.
Power training: power training is strength training performed at a faster speed to increase power and reaction times.
Balance exercises: balance training requires the body to maintain stability during static (standing) and dynamic movement (walking) using single-leg exercises, ladder drills, and walking on uneven surfaces.
Flexibility workouts: flexibility training challenges the ability of the body’s joints to move freely through their full range of motion and helps the body stay limber. Flexibility is critical for decreasing the energy cost of standing and walking as we get older. Stretches that target the shoulders, hips, and legs—body parts that commonly contribute to balance problems and gait compensations—are key.
