Exercise cuts risk of fractures in elderly

Washington:- A new study states that home based exercises which r followed by home training cuts down risk of hip fractures among Elderly women.

According to the researches exercise is linked with long term effects on balancing and manner of walking and also helps in protection of hip fractures in Elderly women.

“Falls are responsible for at least 90 percent of all hip fractures. Hip fractures place the greatest demands on resources and have the greatest effect on patients because they are associated with high mortality rates and increased morbidity,” the author writes as background in the article.

Dr. Raija Korpelainen, of Oulu Deaconess Institute, Oulu, Finland, and colleagues performed an extended follow-up at reducing risk factors for fractures in elderly women with osteopenia (a reduction in bone mass, or low levels of bone calcium.

160 women who participated in the randomized control trial, 84 were assigned to an exercise group, while the remaining 76 were placed in the control group.

The training session was held once a week for a 6 month period from October to March each year from 1998 to 2001, in which the women in the exercise group attended supervised balance and leg strength..

The authors found that, “ fractures were proximal in 52.2% of the control group and 17.6 % of the exercise group. Moderate lifelong physical activity decreased the overall risk of having any fractures during the total follow-up period.”

Additionally, there was no hip fractures in exercise group while there were five fractures found in control group.

The ratio of death between exercise group  and control group was 1:8 which is 0.003 per 1000 women per year in exercise group and 0.03 was the rate in control group.

According to the authors findings, “ 30 months of supervised, mainly home based exercises followed by voluntary home training had a positive long-term effect on balance and gait in high-risk elderly women”.

The study has been published in the latest issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.