Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Vigorous Exercise, Cognitive Decline, and High Blood Pressure

alz-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 140 posts

Re: Vigorous Exercise, Cognitive Decline, and High Blood Pressure

#31

Post by branko_d »

throwawaysleep wrote: post #6
keiferski wrote: post #4

I am no expert on the public health system and so I'm more than willing to be educated/corrected here, but I have the following impression: There is more money to be made by stakeholders treating health problems than there is in preventing them. And so there is a lot more money and effort invested in developing pharmaceutical and treatment solutions than there is in preventing the problems they treat – even though th…

The barrier to exercise isn’t money in most cases. It is that exercise is misery. Exercise sucks. I am overweight. I much prefer Ozempic (and pay a substantial premium for it) vs lifestyle change. So do millions of other Americans who are shelling out for it. You would basically need to economically torture fat people to the point that exercise is less horrible than your incentives. I’m paying 8K a year to avoid exer…

I’ll hazard a guess: you never liked exercise, even as a kid?

If that’s the case, I’ll hazard another guess: you lived in an environment where you couldn’t just go out and play whenever you wanted?

I might be completely wrong in my guesses, and I apologize if I am. But I strongly believe that all kids are naturally predisposed for physical activity, and it’s the duty of the society to let them do that in an easy and safe way.

Re: Vigorous Exercise, Cognitive Decline, and High Blood Pressure

#33

Post by 082349872349872 »

keiferski wrote: post #4

I am no expert on the public health system and so I'm more than willing to be educated/corrected here, but I have the following impression: There is more money to be made by stakeholders treating health problems than there is in preventing them. And so there is a lot more money and effort invested in developing pharmaceutical and treatment solutions than there is in preventing the problems they treat – even though th…

We have many (about 1 per 20'000 people) short circuits consisting of exercise stations scattered about a forest with a jogging/walking path connecting them.

As far as I know, the insurance companies sponsor these, and presumably they find the upkeep costs (under $1'500/year?) pay back in reduced overall payouts?

Re: Vigorous Exercise, Cognitive Decline, and High Blood Pressure

#34

Post by zarzavat »

Somewhat unrelated but is there any SOTA for what “vigorous cardiovascular exercise” should be to optimize benefits?

Should I just exercise flat out and try to sustain that as long as I can, or is there a level of vigorous exertion below flat out that leads to better results because of the longer duration?

Re: Vigorous Exercise, Cognitive Decline, and High Blood Pressure

#35

Post by gwd »

throwawaysleep wrote: post #6
keiferski wrote: post #4

I am no expert on the public health system and so I'm more than willing to be educated/corrected here, but I have the following impression: There is more money to be made by stakeholders treating health problems than there is in preventing them. And so there is a lot more money and effort invested in developing pharmaceutical and treatment solutions than there is in preventing the problems they treat – even though th…

The barrier to exercise isn’t money in most cases. It is that exercise is misery. Exercise sucks. I am overweight. I much prefer Ozempic (and pay a substantial premium for it) vs lifestyle change. So do millions of other Americans who are shelling out for it. You would basically need to economically torture fat people to the point that exercise is less horrible than your incentives. I’m paying 8K a year to avoid exer…

> Exercise sucks.

Lots of people, including myself, love exercising. If nothing else, endorphins are a great natural "high". And I can tell that the rest of my system just works better when I'm working out regularly: I have fewer hunger attacks, I sleep better, I feel better. And, I just really like the feeling of picking up really heavy things (that being my current exercise of choice).

From what I can tell, the "exercise sucks" barriers most people face are 1) not everybody likes everything, and 2) it takes at least 2 months of training to get to the point where you can get the taste for the endorphins without being overly sore afterwards.

Now maybe you've spent 2 months trying all kinds of different activities (swimming, walking, hiking, weight lifting, cycling, wrestling, football) and none of them have worked, in which case fair enough. But if you haven't, I'd recommend trying it.

I can see why if you're overweight that running wouldn't be very fun. If you haven't tried weight lifting, definitely give that a go. If you're overweight, you've got a head start lifting heavy things (you), so it shouldn't be as hard to get into. People who've never lifted weights have this idea that it's mind-numbingly boring; but the mental focus you need to lift heavy things is actually a bit more like meditation. And being able to confidently lift really heavy things is an amazing feeling, not to mention having pumped-up muscles.

Re: Vigorous Exercise, Cognitive Decline, and High Blood Pressure

#36

Post by johnnyanmac »

graemep wrote: post #22
keiferski wrote: post #4

I am no expert on the public health system and so I'm more than willing to be educated/corrected here, but I have the following impression: There is more money to be made by stakeholders treating health problems than there is in preventing them. And so there is a lot more money and effort invested in developing pharmaceutical and treatment solutions than there is in preventing the problems they treat – even though th…

Treating long term is a lot more profitable than curing too. One of the worst things that ever happened to pharmaceutical industry profits was the the discovery that most ulcers can be cheaply cured with antibiotics (which won the discovers a well deserved Nobel prize). Even after this ulcer drugs were hugely profitable. I cannot remember the numbers from when I was an analyst covering them (more than 20 years ago!),…

>the problems are lack of time for exercise and money for a healthy diet.

pretty much. You go to some circles that will keep swearing by "Calories in, Calories out", and blaming any detteral of this as laziness. It's basically the equivalent of saying "stop smoking" to a smoker. Yes, they are objectiely right, but also miss all the subtlety of the steps needed to "stop smoking".

Time is definitely the biggest factor, and modern society feels like it's demanding more time than ever of workers for less spending power than ever. Of course people don't have time to work on their diet/exercise when some are working 2+ jobs at barely above minimum wage.

Re: Vigorous Exercise, Cognitive Decline, and High Blood Pressure

#37

Post by personalityson »

"Scientists researching possible candidates for treating Alzheimer's disease found exercise outperformed all tested drugs for the ability to reverse dysregulated gene expression." https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-22179-z

"High fitness in middle age reduces the chance of dementia by ninety percent" https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/03/180315101805.h...

Re: Vigorous Exercise, Cognitive Decline, and High Blood Pressure

#38

Post by phoebos »

zarzavat wrote: post #34

Somewhat unrelated but is there any SOTA for what “vigorous cardiovascular exercise” should be to optimize benefits? Should I just exercise flat out and try to sustain that as long as I can, or is there a level of vigorous exertion below flat out that leads to better results because of the longer duration?

It was self-assessed:

> When we say ‘vigorous’ we mean activities that make you sweat, increase your heart rate or increase your breathing. Please think about vigorous activities that you may have done at home or at places of work other than your home, as well as vigorous recreational activities or conditioning exercises. Please think over the last year and indicate how often you participate in vigorous activities.

Re: Vigorous Exercise, Cognitive Decline, and High Blood Pressure

#39

Post by gwd »

isaacfrond wrote: post #29

Let's do it one more time. Correlation != Causation Could the causation conceivably run the other direction? People with beginning dementia exercise less? Yes, that is quite conceivable actually. Could there be a common cause explaining both? Yes, if you are in good health, with good genes, a good job, leisure time and money, then probably you are the type of person who'll live longer, sport more, and be cognitively…

> Baseline self-reported frequency of VPA was categorized into low VPA (So yeah, this is a mere correlational study, and a self-reported one at that. So technically, it could even be that people who think they exercise harder have better health outcomes.

Re: Vigorous Exercise, Cognitive Decline, and High Blood Pressure

#40

Post by drited »

isaacfrond wrote: post #29

Let's do it one more time. Correlation != Causation Could the causation conceivably run the other direction? People with beginning dementia exercise less? Yes, that is quite conceivable actually. Could there be a common cause explaining both? Yes, if you are in good health, with good genes, a good job, leisure time and money, then probably you are the type of person who'll live longer, sport more, and be cognitively…

Yes methodology here seems suspect. Also: Activity levels were self reported. Could just be that early stages of dementia cause individuals to forget - either that they exercised or to exercise or to report.
Post reply on HN