Fat heart patients: Take long walks
Long-distance walking on a daily basis may take off twice the weight and result in greater loss of fat mass than standard cardiac rehabilitation in overweight heart patients, researchers say.
What’s more, in addition to losing fat mass and twice the weight, overweight coronary patients on a steady walking regimen apparently can improve their insulin sensitivity to a greater degree than people undergoing standard cardiac rehabilitation, says a new study in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association.
In the study, researchers at the University of Vermont randomized 74 overweight cardiac rehab patients whose average age was 64 to either a high-caloric expenditure exercise regimen, aimed at burning 3,000 to 3,500 calories a week by walking almost daily, or to standard therapy, burning 700 to 800 calories a week, exercising three times per week.
Shedding weight on a daily basis called for walking 45-60 minutes at a moderate pace — a lower speed than standard therapy — for five to six days per week.
The standard rehab called for walking, biking, or rowing for 25-40 minutes at a brisker pace, but only three times per week.
Five months into the study, the researchers compared the two groups and found that patients doing the daily walking had: …
