Study finds vigorous exercise may have lasting benefits

As we age, Changes are happening As brain function declines, seniors may find certain activities, like paying attention, a little harder to do, and they may take longer to learn new skills.

The elderly, dementiaTherefore, prevention measures and interventions are even more important in this age group, as the researchers of the current study point out that aging may affect the hippocampus. Hippocampus The hippocampus is a key part of the brain that aids in memory processing, decision making, and converting short-term memories into long-term memories. Alzheimer’s disease, a common form of dementia, also affects the hippocampus.

Therefore, investigating how interventions affect this region of the brain could be highly beneficial in addressing cognitive decline in older adults, possibly Preventing dementia.

“A key feature of age-related dementia is a decline in specific areas of cognitive function, particularly those associated with spatial learning and memory. The hippocampus is a key region of the brain responsible for consolidating spatial information into memory and is particularly susceptible to the effects of aging, with reports showing declines in hippocampal volume and connectivity with age.”

–Study author

Non-study authors Dr. Michelle LongoNeurologist at the University of New Orleans Medical Center offered the following opinion: Today’s Medical News:

“Exercise-mediated responses of biomarkers predicting improved hippocampal functional outcomes provide a quantifiable indicator for informing effective exercise planning. The improvement and long-term maintenance of hippocampal learning capacity following HIIT exercise provides novel insight into how older adults are protected from cognitive decline despite the potential decline in exercise capacity with age. This approach may significantly enhance clinicians’ ability to customize exercise paradigms for individuals, including those at risk for cognitive decline.”

The study was a multi-domain randomized controlled trial. Researchers recruited 194 participants aged 65 to 85 years. Participants who had previously had a stroke were excluded. Brain traumathose who have had brain or heart surgery, or those at high risk of having a heart attack. heart attack During exercise. Participants had no diagnosed psychiatric disorders or cognitive decline at baseline.

Participants were divided into three groups, each receiving different levels of exercise intensity.

1. Low-intensity training, including activities such as stretching, range of motion, and balance exercises
2. Moderate-intensity training was continuous treadmill walk
3. High-intensity training (which included interval training on a treadmill) increased heart rate significantly more than the moderate-intensity training group.

The high-intensity training group Aerobic and anaerobic exercise.

The participants were put through an exercise program and exercised three days a week for six months under the supervision of an exercise physiologist. The researchers subjected the participants to several tests to assess cognitive and hippocampal function, including the hippocampal-dependent paired-associate learning (PAL) test. They also took monthly blood samples from the participants to obtain valuable biomarker information.

The researchers Cognitive testing Surveys were administered monthly during the intervention period, and participants were then followed up every six months for up to five years.

The study found that hippocampal-dependent spatial learning improved in the HIIT group, whereas the other two groups showed no improvement and remained stable. This improvement was maintained over a 5-year follow-up period in the HIIT group, and appears to be independent of differences in lifestyle and physical activity during the follow-up period.

The researchers also found that participants who initially performed poorly on the PAL assessments initially showed the most improvement when they participated in the HIIT group. Participants who performed poorly in the moderate-intensity training group also showed some improvement on these assessments, but not as much as the HIIT group. They also found that the volume of the right hippocampus remained stable in the HIIT group, while the other groups experienced a decrease in the volume of this brain region.

The researchers found that the high- and moderate-intensity groups had better structural health across additional brain regions than the low-intensity group, and observed “improved functional connectivity between multiple neural networks” in the high-intensity interval training group. However, at 12 months, no improvements in functional connectivity between network pairs were observed compared to baseline in any of the groups.

They also observed that changes in certain biomarkers in the HIIT group correlated with improved associative learning. The researchers did not find that the exercise intervention helped improve working memory or emotion recognition.

The results indicate that exercise has potential benefits for the brain, especially for those who engage in high-intensity interval training.

Non-study authors Ryan Glatt, CPT, NBC-HWCDr. David L. Schneider, senior brain health coach and director of the FitBrain program at the Pacific Neuroscience Institute in Santa Monica, California, noted the clinical implications of this data: Today’s Medical News:

“This study suggests that high-intensity interval training (HIIT) can significantly improve hippocampal-dependent learning in healthy older adults. Although promising, results should be interpreted with caution due to variability in individual responses to exercise and specific study populations. If supported by further studies, these findings may inform exercise-based interventions for cognitive health in older adults and promote HIIT as a non-pharmacological strategy to mitigate age-related cognitive decline.”

This study has certain limitations. First, the number of participants was small, so future studies could include a larger sample to see if the results are the same.

The researchers were further limited by inclusion and exclusion criteria, such as only including participants who could communicate in English and had no history of specific diseases. They also did not include people with existing cognitive impairments, and did not have a sedentary control group, which would have helped examine whether social interaction affects hippocampal function. The study included healthy older adults who were able to participate in this exercise intervention, so it is unclear whether the intervention is feasible for people with more health problems.

The researchers further acknowledged that further research is needed to understand whether exercise affects working memory and the differences observed in the HIIT group. Finally, the researchers acknowledged that it is unclear whether a similar HIIT regimen would produce the same results, which may also be a focus of future research.

Study author, Dr. Daniel G. BlackmoreResearchers from the University of Queensland Brain Institute identified the following as areas for continued research:

“There are many avenues for future research in this field. We have shown that a highly controlled exercise intervention, taking into account multiple parameters, is important. The use of biomarkers as diagnostic tools for exercise requires further research, and we are now also looking at genetic factors that may modulate a person’s response to exercise to see if we can identify who will and will not respond to this intervention.”