One Hour of Daily Exercise Needed to Prevent Weight gain!
Women need one hour of moderate intensity physical activity every day in order to prevent weight gain. This is according to a recent study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
Study authors set out to clarify the amount of physical activity that is required to prevent long-term weight gain among women following a usual diet.
The study included 34,079 healthy US women, with an average age of 54.2 years. The study subjects were followed from 1992 to 2007.
The average weight gain during this study was 5.7 lbs over five years.
There was a significant relationship between the effect of physical activity and the the Body Mass Index (BMI) readings.
Among women with a BMI of less than 25, there was an inverse dose-response relationship between activity levels and weight gain. However, no such relationship occurred among women with a BMI from 25 to 29.9 or in those with a BMI of 30.0 or more.
In 4,500 women whose BMI was less than 25 at the beginning of the study and who successfully maintained their weight by gaining less than 5.7 lbs during the study, the average activity level over the five years was approximately 60 minutes per day of moderate-intensity exercise.
This study shows that women need to exercise at least one hour per day in order to prevent weight gain over their lifetime. These conclusions may not be completely accurate given the study was limited by the fact that the women self-reported their activity levels and weight measurements. In addition, the women in the study did not report on dietary habits. The study did not address activity levels needed for weight management among women who were restricting caloric intake.
Cristopher Geiler, MD
Reference
JAMA. 2010;303:1173-1179
Posted on March 26, 2010
