新視野大學(xué)英語(yǔ)讀寫教程第三冊(cè)u(píng)nit2-c Exercise For the Old

Section(C)
Exercise for the Old

As a scientist, one of Steven Wolf's favorite questions to ask people at the end of a study is: "What can you do now that you couldn't do before?" One of the best answers he's ever received came from an 86-year-old man who learned the ancient Chinese exercise form of tai chi as part of Wolf's study of how exercise can help seniors prevent falls.
"The man smiled at me, then lifted up one foot, bent over, and took off his shoe while balancing on his other leg," recalls Wolf, a professor and researcher. "Then, still balancing on one leg, the 86-year-old gentleman stood back up, bent over again, and put his loafer back on. What impressed me the most was that he couldn't do this before studying tai chi." Although many people assume that balance and movement problems are inevitable with age, an increasing body of evidence demonstrates that exercise can help improve balance and strength in elderly individuals and reduce their chance of falling. In Wolf's study, published in May 1996, 215 seniors aged 70 to 96 were divided into three groups. One group performed balance exercises on a computer-controlled platform once a week, one group took a weekly tai chi class, and a control group met for a weekly discussion. After 15 weeks, "the tai chi group did the best, and reduced the chance of having a fall by 47 percent," Wolf said.

In addition, the tai chi group also showed significant improvement in the condition of their hearts and quality-of-life measurements, such as a reduced fear of falling and an increased sense of control over their lives. "Tai chi has been used in China as an exercise for older individuals for three centuries and as a military art for 2,000 years," Wolf says. "The movements are very slow and careful and involve a great deal of body movement and standing on a single limb. Practicing these movements is like learning strategies you can use to avoid falling down." Tai chi is just one form of exercise studied for its fall-preventing benefits as part of a recently completed six-year project by the National Institute on Aging and the National Institute of Nursing Research. More than 1,500 seniors at seven sites around the country participated in the trials. "The studies showed that even a low level of exercise can reduce the risk of falls," notes Washington University scientist Michael Province, whose analysis of the data on exercise and fall prevention appeared last year in The Journal of the American Medical Association. "Exercise can help older adults improve strength, balance, the ability to bend, and prevents them from tiring as easily. Improvements in one area often carry over into another."

In general, "the evidence is increasing that the more older people can do in terms of exercise, the better off they are — with two pieces of advice," says Province. First, older exercisers should be sure to check with a doctor to make sure any new exercise program is safe and appropriate. Second, seniors should start under the guidance of a qualified teacher to make sure they're doing exercises properly and not doing too much, too soon — especially if they've been inactive. "The problem is that to improve balance, you've got to challenge balance, which is always risky," says Mary E. Tinetti of the Yale University School of Medicine, who studied 301 men and women aged 70 and older with at least one risk factor for falling, such as muscle weakness or use of certain medicines.

To reduce these seniors' risk of falling, Tinetti used multiple methods, including having an exercise teacher go to a person's home and teach balance exercises. "The teacher wasn't necessarily there with them every time they did the exercise," Tinetti notes.

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