Brisk exercise could be best medicine for an ailing heart

ONE year of moderately vigorous weekly exercise in middle age may be enough to reverse signs of heart problems, according to researchers at UT Southwestern Medical Centre in America.

They asked 31 adults in their 50s with early indications of heart failure — where heart muscle becomes too weak to pump blood properly — to do either yoga or more intense exercise (walking, cycling or swimming) for at least an hour a week, plus regular strength training.

After a year, those doing more vigorous weekly exercise had better heart function and healthier heart muscle. Those on the gentler exercise regimen did not improve at all, reports the journal Circulation.

The results add weight to the idea that ‘exercise is medicine’, the study says.