Gaby
For years, walking at least 10,000 steps a day has been considered the gold standard for physical activity. Regular walking helps maintain fitness and slows the development of diseases.
However, a new study shows you don’t necessarily need to clock a huge number of steps to get health benefits. Not everyone has time for long strolls, so what can replace lengthy walks?
What Researchers Discovered
A team from Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, USA, analyzed data from 14,399 women aged 62 and older (the average age of participants was 72). Each woman wore a fitness tracker to measure her activity level and completed an annual survey about her health and habits, including questions about weight changes, smoking, alcohol use, menopause, and personal and family medical history.
The team found that women who took 8,000 to 8,500 steps a day cut their risk of cardiovascular disease by about 40 percent compared with women who walked roughly 3,000 steps daily.
They also found the same reduction in risk among participants who did 75 minutes of physical activity a day. The team said there’s no need to fixate on a specific step count. There are other ways to improve health and lose weight that can be done regularly in a set amount of time.
Dr. Rikuta Hamaya, the study’s lead author, said, “Everyone chooses their own form of movement, and nearly all forms of movement are beneficial for our health.”
So you can choose workouts measured by time or by steps—both work.
The results of the study were published in JAMA Internal Medicine.
