Deans' stroke musings: Protective Effect of Time Spent Walking on Risk of Stroke in Older Men

Changing stroke rehab and research worldwide now.Time is Brain! trillions and trillions of neurons that DIE each day because there are NO effective hyperacute therapies besides tPA(only 12% effective). I have 523 posts on hyperacute therapy, enough for researchers to spend decades proving them out. These are my personal ideas and blog on stroke rehabilitation and stroke research. Do not attempt any of these without checking with your medical provider. Unless you join me in agitating, when you need these therapies they won't be there.

What this blog is for:

My blog is not to help survivors recover, it is to have the 10 million yearly stroke survivors light fires underneath their doctors, stroke hospitals and stroke researchers to get stroke solved. 100% recovery. The stroke medical world is completely failing at that goal, they don't even have it as a goal. Shortly after getting out of the hospital and getting NO information on the process or protocols of stroke rehabilitation and recovery I started searching on the internet and found that no other survivor received useful information. This is an attempt to cover all stroke rehabilitation information that should be readily available to survivors so they can talk with informed knowledge to their medical staff. It lays out what needs to be done to get stroke survivors closer to 100% recovery. It's quite disgusting that this information is not available from every stroke association and doctors group.

Friday, November 15, 2013

Protective Effect of Time Spent Walking on Risk of Stroke in Older Men

At least I'm not older yet. But I'll have to do my nightly walks around the ponds on a regular basis, mainly to try to get a decent knee bend and leg swing. More cigars also. Now if we had legalized marijuana it could be really fun.
http://stroke.ahajournals.org/content/early/2013/11/14/STROKEAHA.113.002246.abstract

+ Author Affiliations

From the Department of Primary Care and Population Health (B.J.J., O.P., S.G.W.) and Physical Activity Research Group (B.J.J.), UCL, London, United Kingdom; and Division of Population Health Sciences and Education, SGUL, London, United Kingdom (P.H.W.).

Correspondence to Barbara J. Jefferis, PhD, Department of Primary Care and Population Health, UCL, Rowland Hill St, London NW3 2PF, United Kingdom. E-mail b.jefferis@ucl.ac.uk

Abstract

Background and Purpose—Older adults have the highest risks of stroke and the lowest physical activity levels. It is important to quantify how walking (the predominant form of physical activity in older age) is associated with stroke.

Methods—A total of 4252 men from a UK population-based cohort reported usual physical activity (regular walking, cycling, recreational activity, and sport) in 1998 to 2000. Nurses took fasting blood samples and made anthropometric measurements.

Results—Among 3435 ambulatory men free from cardiovascular disease and heart failure in 1998 to 2000, 195 first strokes occurred during 11-year follow-up. Men walked a median of 7 (interquartile range, 3–12) hours/wk; walking more hours was associated with lower heart rate, D-dimer, and higher forced expiratory volume in 1 second. Compared with men walking 0 to 3 hours/wk, men walking 4 to 7, 8 to 14, 15 to 21, and >22 hours had age- and region-adjusted hazard ratios (95% confidence intervals) for stroke of 0.89 (0.60–1.31), 0.63 (0.40–1.00), 0.68 (0.35–1.32), and 0.36 (0.14–0.91), respectively, P (trend)=0.006. Hazard ratios were somewhat attenuated by adjustment for established and novel risk markers (inflammatory and hemostatic markers and cardiac function [N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide]) and walking pace, but linear trends remained. There was little evidence for a dose–response relationship between walking pace and stroke; comparing average pace or faster to a baseline of slow pace, the hazard ratio for stroke was 0.65 (95% confidence interval, 0.44–0.97), which was fully mediated by time spent walking.

Conclusions—Time spent walking was associated with reduced risk of onset of stroke in dose–response fashion, independent of walking pace. Walking could form an important part of stroke-prevention strategies in older people.