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Topics: Science, Health, Environment
Lucy Devine
A study has revealed that changing the way you walk could have a big impact to your health.
We all have one friend or family member who tends to walk very fast. Keeping up with them can be pretty challenging and we're constantly telling them to slow down.
But turns out, they might be onto something.
A new study published in the journal Heart has revealed that a change in the pace of walking is associated with a lower risk of heart abnormalities, including atrial fibrillation, bradyarrhythmias and ventricular arrhythmias.
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Atrial fibrillation is an irregular heart rhythm that begins in the heart's upper chambers.
Symptoms can include fatigue, heart palpitations, breathing issues and dizziness.
Meanwhile, bradyarrhythmias refers to an abnormally slow heart rate - usually below 60 bpm - and a ventricular arrhythmia is an abnormal heart rhythm originating in the heart's lower chambers, which can lead to the heart beating dangerously fast.
The study found that walking at a brisk pace was associated with a lower risks of all heart rhythm abnormalities.
According to senior author of the study Dr Jill Pell, of the University of Glasgow in Scotland, the study has highlighted an accessible way to improve heart health.
“The great thing about walking is that it is accessible to everyone,” she told CNN.
“You don’t need to spend money going to a gym or buying equipment. You can just walk out of your front door and keep going.
“There are medicines and procedures that can be offered to these people but it would be preferable to prevent heart rhythm abnormalities from occurring in the first place."
To conduct the study, authors looked at health data from a group of participants taking part in the UK Biobank study back in the early noughties.
Participants were asked about their walking pace and how fast it was. They could choose between slow, average or brisk.
Around 6.5 percent had a slow walking pace, 53 percent an average pace and 41 percent reported a brisk pace.
The study found that walking at an average or brisk pace was associated with a 35 percent and 43 percent lower risk of heart abnormalities, respectively.
“We had data on self-reported walking pace from more than 420,000 people but we also had accelerometry data on (nearly) 82,000 of these,” Pell said.
“The data from the watches showed that walking at an average pace (3-4 miles per hour) for only 5-15 minutes per day was sufficient to reduce your risk.”
The results were highest among those under 60, and interestingly, in more women than men.
“This is an interesting finding because, although women are less likely to get atrial fibrillation than men, when they do get it they are at a higher risk of going on to get heart attacks and strokes than men with atrial fibrillation,” added Pell.
There are some limitations with the study, however, with Pell explaining that if a person already has a pre-existing condition, they may walk slower.
“We did everything possible to avoid this by making sure that no one had any type of heart or vascular disease at the beginning of the study," said Pell.
“However, we really need an intervention study now to confirm our findings: a study of people who walk slowly in which some are asked to increase their walking pace and some are not."