Give yourself a Lift (by Joel Lyons

By Joel Lyons, PT, OCS

13 To Delay Death, Lift Weights

A friend recently forwarded to me an Outside magazine article by the same title as this one. It was written by Alex Hutchinson in the November 22 2017 issue. I thought it was apropos for our membership as well as the public in general. In the past I’ve emphasized the importance of strength in injury prevention and performance enhancement. Now there is another good reason: to live longer.

Alex reported two research papers that offered some interesting information. The first was published in Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise. The scientist assessed 4,440 adults age 50 and over who had strength and muscle mass assessed between 1999 and 2002. The researchers went back to these participants in 2011 to see who was still alive and if there were some statistically significant findings.

What they found was simply that those with low muscle strength were more than twice as likely to have died during the follow-up period as those with normal strength. In contrast, having low muscle mass didn’t seem to matter as much. Looking a little further into the data, they also found that those with both low muscle strength and low muscle mass (i.e. weak and small amount of muscle) were actually 2.66 times as likely to die during the time period. There was good news for those with low muscle mass and normal strength: they actually fared about the same as the control group.

Mr. Hutchinson reports that the takeaway from this is that function matters more than what you look like. He states that it doesn’t mean you can allow your muscles to melt away as you age, but keep up your strength workouts despite the fact that you will lose muscle mass as you age. You also must maintain a healthy diet if you are to have the building blocks for this retention of muscle.

The second study he reported about took aim at the perception that strength training is an afterthought in public health guidelines. He states that most of us remember that we’re supposed to get at least 150 minutes of moderate exercise or 75 minutes of vigorous exercise per week (I find this a little surprising. By my own experience the average American has no idea how much they should exercise; only that they should). He goes on to say that the guidelines also suggest doing “strength-promoting exercises” at least twice a week – a clause that is often forgotten. ( I have seen this often with my patients. The majority of those who report going to the gym will state they only do some form of cardio (treadmill, bike, elliptical) but no strengthening. Do you think the same could be said of our membership?)

After researchers analyzed data from 80,000 adults who completed surveys about their physical activity, the headline result was that those who reported doing any strength training were 23% less likely to die during the study period, and 31% less likely to die of cancer. Also of interest was the finding that it didn’t matter if you exercised in a gym or at home. (On a side note, one thing that strength training didn’t do was decrease the risk of heart disease.) Another finding was that those who met strength training and aerobic guidelines had the best outcome by far: a 29% reduction in mortality risk during the study period.

The author reiterates what is fairly obvious by now: strength training is good for you. However, he goes on to say that he hopes a reminder of something obvious, bolstered by fresh evidence, just might convince you to do something that you know you should. I couldn’t agree more. So go ahead and pick up a dumbbell this week, you’ll likely live a little longer! ... strength training is good for you.