Enhancing Inflammatory Factors, Nitric Oxide, and Arterial Stiffness Through Aquatic Walking for Amelioration and Disease Prevention: Targeting in Obese Elderly Women.

Abstract

In elderly women, hormonal changes lead to elevated body fat content, which results in elevated levels of vascular inflammatory factors, thereby increasing the risk of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) associated with endothelial dysfunction. Regular physical exercises tend to keep these in check and are protective to the body. Aerobic exercise has been reported to improve CVD in obese elderly women; in this regard, aquatic exercises have been demonstrated to be more efficient in energy metabolism than land-based exercise. This study aimed to examine the effect of aquatic walking exercises on the levels of inflammatory factors, nitric oxide (NO), and brachial-ankle pulse wave velocity (baPWV) in obese elderly women. We measured these in 26 obese elderly women who were randomly assigned to control (n = 12) and aquatic walking exercise (n = 14) groups. After subjecting them to aquatic walking exercises thrice a week for 12 weeks, we specifically found a significant reduction in IL-6 levels and an increase in NO levels in these obese elderly women. This was paralleled with a reduction in the right baPWV (baPWV-R). Together, these results indicate that aquatic walking exercises can help improve vascular inflammatory factors, NO levels, and arterial stiffness.