Children need a minimum of seven minutes a day of vigorous physical activity, demonstrates recently published findings by University of Alberta medical researchers and their colleagues across Canada.
"If you watch late-night television, or look in the backs of magazines, you'll see magical ads saying you need just 10 minutes a day or five minutes a day of exercise to stay fit. And for those of us in the medical field, we just rolled our eyes at that. But surprisingly, they may actually be right and that's what this research shows," says co-principal investigator Richard Lewanczuk, a researcher with the Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry at the U of A.
"Our research showed children don't need a lot of intense physical activity to get the health benefits of exercise seven minutes or more of vigorous physical activity was all that was required. But the seven minutes had to be intense to prevent weight gain, obesity and its adverse health consequences. And most kids weren't getting that."
Lewanczuk worked on this study with Jonathan McGavock, his co-principal investigator and former post-doctoral fellow, who now works with the Manitoba Institute of Child Health. They collaborated with Black Gold Regional Schools in Leduc and surrounding communities just south of Edmonton, as well as researchers from the University of Manitoba, Queen's University, the University of Newcastle, and U of A researchers from the Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry, the School of Public Health, Physical Education and Recreation, and Agricultural, Life and Environmental Sciences. The team's findings were recently published in the peer-reviewed journal Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine.
More than 600 children, between the ages of nine to 17 from Leduc and surrounding areas, wore monitors that tracked their physical activity levels for seven days. These children also had their weight, waist circumference and blood pressure regularly monitored.
| Contact: Raquel Maurier raquel.maurier@ualberta.ca 780-492-5986 University of Alberta Faculty of Medicine & Dentistry Source:Eurekalert |