Resistance Training Can Slow Down Cognitive Decline In Aged Women

Resistance training can slow down cognitive decline in aged women, Canadian researchers say.

Resistance training is any exercise that causes the muscles to contract against an external resistance with the expectation of increases in strength, tone, mass, and/or endurance. The external resistance can be dumbbells, rubber exercise tubing, your own body weight, bricks, bottles of water, or any other object that causes the muscles to contract. When you lift weights at the gym to get stronger or bigger or more toned, you are performing resistance exercise.

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Cognitive decline among seniors is a pressinghealth care issue. Specific exercise training may combat cognitivedecline. A team of Vancouver-based doctors compared the effect of once-weekly and twice-weeklyresistance training with that of twice-weekly balance and toneexercise training on the performance of executive cognitivefunctions in senior women.

In a single-blinded randomized trial, 155 community-dwellingwomen aged 65 to 75 years living in Vancouver were randomlyallocated to once-weekly or twice-weeklyresistance training or twice-weekly balanceand tone training.

Both resistance training groups significantlyimproved their performance on the Stroop psychological test compared withthose in the balance and tone group.

Taskperformance improved by 12.6% and 10.9% in the once-weekly andtwice-weekly resistance training groups, respectively.

Hence twelve months of once-weekly or twice-weeklyresistance training benefited the executive cognitive functionof selective attention and conflict resolution among seniorwomen, concluded the researchers in their paper published in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

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Previous research has found that aerobic exercise such as walking and swimming can help keep people mentally sharp as they age, yet few have looked at the effects on brain health of weight training aimed at building and strengthening muscles and bone.

"We were able to demonstrate that simple training with weights that seniors can easily handle improved ability to make accurate decisions quickly," said principal researcher Teresa Liu-Ambrose of the Centre for Hip Health and Mobility at Vancouver General Hospital.

Source-Medindia
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