Exercise... the miracle treatment

Regular physical activity can reduce the risk of everything from diabetes and depression to dementia and even cancer – it might be the best ten minutes a day you’ve ever spent...

Exercise is a miracle cure – or at least a miracle treatment – for almost everything. Studies consistently show that it can reduce your risk of stroke, type 2 diabetes and even some cancers by up to 50 per cent – and lower your risk of early death by up to 30 per cent.

It can reduce your risk of osteoarthritis by up to 83 per cent and help prevent falls (thereby increasing your lifespan). Exercise can also boost mood and sleep quality, and reduce your chances of developing depression, dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. Put simply, it’s one of the ultimate anti-ageing activities and it is the key to living well for longer.

So, shaking up your activity levels is possibly the most important piece of advice in our Good Health For Life Wellness Journal – even if you do nothing more than start exercising regularly after reading this you can be confident that you will start sleeping better, you’ll have less pain and you will almost certainly live longer.

We all know we should try to be more active but s t rength, or muscle power, often gets lost in the mix. In fact , studies show strength training is

important for bone health (it helps increase bone density and reduces the risk of osteoporosis), it helps with balance (which would otherwise deteriorate with age), it boosts your metabolism (because muscles burn calories even when you’re asleep) and makes losing weight easier too. Strength is the route to keeping you injury-free as well.

It might have been years since you made a movement more powerful than lifting a heavy bag of shopping, so do start slowly. Aim low to begin with, then build up. We recommend a short strength workout for just a few minutes per day, six days per week.

However, this doesn’t mean spending hours in the gym. You can do it in your pyjamas without any equipment. You can choose to follow our plan on page 30 of your Good Health For Life Wellness Journal, join a strengthbased exercise class, commit to regula r gym sessions, go to a yoga class, or fol low your favour i te strength- based exercise DVD. The nhs. uk website has a series of excellent strength exercise videos (s e a r c h for ‘ st rength and flex exercise plan’). Just make sure you do it regularly. We suggest first thing each morning.

Whichever you choose, you should aim to increase your strength by building up repetitions (ie gradually doing more of the same exercise), making the process progressively harder for yourself as your muscles get stronger.

You also need to stay fit – the NHS recommended minimum amount of exercise is either 150 minutes of moderate physical activity or 75 minutes of vigorous activity every week. Moderate exercise is a brisk walk. Vigorous exercise is jogging. Simply by walking for 15 minutes to and from work five days per week you’ll have ticked that box.

This is the point at which you might normally read some sort of medical disclaimer along the lines of ‘always consult your doctor before starting any exercise programme’, but we don’t believe this kind of caution is always necessary.

Do, however, start gently: make sure you can happily walk before you run, and when you do run, start slowly. You should finish all exercise for the first few weeks wanting to do more. Once you’ve built a base of fitness and strength you can start to push yourself. There are excellent resources on the NHS website (nhs.uk) to guide you.