Can exercise slow the incidence of cardiovascular disease? Study: Doing enough push-ups may reduce your risk of heart disease

Cardiovascular disease is a silent killer! Cardiovascular disease ranked second among the causes of death in 2018, and it has recently shown a trend of becoming younger! In addition to genetic reasons, other factors that may easily induce cardiovascular disease include the three highs caused by unhealthy diet, overweight or obesity, and lack of regular exercise. In addition to eating a healthy diet, is there a chance that exercise can help prevent cardiovascular disease? A recent foreign study pointed out that by doing push-ups as part of aerobic exercise, it seems that physical activity can be increased, thereby reducing the risk of cardiovascular disease.

In the past, scholars from the American Heart Association (AHA) published a study in the journal Circulation, pointing out that insufficient physical activity is not conducive to cardiovascular health. In order to understand whether the risk of cardiovascular disease can be reduced through intense aerobic exercise, the researchers conducted further research.

Study: People who completed the highest number of push-ups had a 96% lower risk of cardiovascular disease than those who completed the lowest number of push-ups

According to a study by Justin, an occupational medicine resident in the Department of Environmental Health at Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health. A study conducted by Dr. Justin Yang and his research team and published in the journal JAMA Network Open, affiliated with the American Journal of Medicine, pointed out that men who can complete 40 push-ups in one minute have a significantly lower risk of cardiovascular disease than men who can do less than 10 push-ups.

The subjects of the study were adult male active firefighters aged between 21 and 66 from 10 fire departments in Indiana, USA. They underwent annual regular health checks, recorded the number of push-ups they did per minute at the beginning, and were divided into five groups in descending order. The record-keeping period started from 2000 to 2010, and all subjects, whether tested first or later, underwent a 10-year follow-up survey. After the follow-up was completed, an analysis was conducted in 2018. After 10 years, the final cumulative number of subjects was 8,601, of which 37 subjects were found to have cardiovascular disease.

The researchers measured the number of push-ups by counting the number of push-ups starting with a metronome at 80 beats per minute, dividing them into groups from 0 to 40 times, with an interval of 10 times per group, and divided them into five groups: 0-10 times, 11-20 times, 21-30 times, 31-40 times, and more than 40 times. After dividing the subjects into groups, the researchers recorded the survival rate of each group every year for a period of 10 years. Finally, the researchers found that the subjects who completed more than 40 push-ups in 1 minute had a 96% lower risk of cardiovascular disease than those who could do less than 10 push-ups; and the subjects who completed 21-30 push-ups in 1 minute had a 75% lower risk of cardiovascular disease than those who could do less than 10 push-ups.

Research: Subjects who completed more than 40 push-ups in 1 minute had a 96% lower risk of cardiovascular disease than those who could do less than 10 push-ups.

Judging from the experimental results, exercising using push-ups seems to be a good choice for improving cardiovascular health! But how should you do push-ups correctly? Here are some tips for doing pushups from exercise physiologist Dr. Elizabeth Quinn, who holds an MS in Exercise Science and a BS in Psychology, completed graduate internships at the Cooper Clinic and Aerobics Institute in Dallas, Texas, and is a former Irish National Road and Track Cycling Championship silver medalist:

[Push-up Action Guide]

Traditional Push-up

First, before doing any fitness exercises, you should do a short warm-up exercise. When you get into the ready position, spread your hands out to shoulder width with your hands straight. When entering the starting movement, you must keep the line connecting your feet, hips and shoulders in a straight line. When pressing your body down, bend your elbows to 90 degrees, then push up back to the starting position and repeat.

When you get into the ready position, spread your hands out to shoulder width with your hands straight. When entering the starting movement, you must keep the line between your feet, hips and shoulders in a straight line. Traditional push-up: When pressing your body down, bend your elbows to 90 degrees, and then push up back to the starting position.

In addition, Dr. Elizabeth Quinn also mentioned that for people with insufficient core strength in the upper body, such as most women, there is another modified version of the push-up, which is the kneeling push-up. The main difference is that the knees are used to provide support for the body to assist in the lack of core strength.

Kneeling push-up

Kneeling push-ups: The only difference from traditional push-ups is that in the preparatory position, the feet should be crossed at the ankles, the knees bent at about 90 degrees, the front of the thighs touching the ground, and be careful not to lift the hips during the movement.

Before doing kneeling push-ups, you should also do warm-up exercises first; when entering the preparatory position, the upper body posture is the same as the traditional push-up, keeping the feet, hips and shoulders in a straight line, and bending the elbows to 90 degrees as the body presses down. The only difference is that in the preparatory position, the feet should be crossed at the ankles, the knees bent at about 90 degrees, the front of the thighs touching the ground, and be careful not to lift the hips during the movement.