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Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

bjsm.bmj.com

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Re: Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

#241

Post by kccqzy »

nateberkopec wrote: post #119
xwowsersx wrote: post #113

Are there cheap fitness bands or smart watches that can somewhat accurately track VO2 max?

You don’t need a watch. You can estimate VO2 max yourself by doing a max effort 1.5 mile run and applying a regression equation: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4795745/ That’s all the watches are doing anyway. Even if you do buy a watch, keep in mind you need to run regular max effort runs to get an accurate value.

So if you buy a watch but run slower than max effort, wouldn't it the watch record an inaccurate value? The watch probably only determines effort through heart rate but that has significant individual differences.

Re: Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

#242

Post by throwaway2037 »

Aperocky wrote: post #47

Fortunately, this seems relatively simple to change (compared to other things with this magnitude of impact). It was a transformative experience to go from 40 VO2max to 57 (as reported by Apple Watch, and losing 30lbs on the way) over the past 12 months. The best part about it is that I didn't even have to give up anything - the extra energy I gained from 90-120 minutes of aerobics per day also had the effect of maki…

I love these kinds of posts. They are ridiculous.

First:

    > Fortunately, this seems relatively simple to change
Second:

    > the extra energy I gained from 90-120 minutes of aerobics per day
Are you joking? You are asking average people to commit to 90-120 of c-v exercise per day? So, 7 days per week? This stuff is nonsense. Most people would quit after a week. I guess 99% of people could not sustain this for more than 3 months.

Re: Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

#243

Post by Fricken »

cycomanic wrote: post #168

Weird that people seem to assert that causality is not established? There are hundreds to thousands of studies that show that pretty much all markers for mortality and morbidity go down with excercise, i.e. put someone regulalrly on a treadmill for a couple of month and pretty much all health markers improve. People implying that the study shows only correlation really don't seem to understand how we establish causal…

Exercise is a four letter word for many on HN. Content posted here touting the various benefits of exercise is always met with mental gymnastics from commenters who would rather do anything but go out and break a sweat.

Re: Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

#244

Post by throwaway2037 »

SamPatt wrote: post #189
38 wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2 hours a day is a ridiculous amount

Why is two hours ridiculous? I find most people who devote themselves like this enjoy the process. If they enjoy it, it objectively improves their body, and they have the time - why not?

    > Why is two hours ridiculous?
Because it isn't sustainable, except for 0.1% of people.

Re: Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

#245

Post by weatherlite »

noonanibus wrote: post #201
snemvalts wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead, people try to fix it with antidepressants, benzodiazepines or something else. It feels a bit like the US approach to pain management – instead of massages or physical therapy, some opioid pill is cheaper to prescribe.

It's not that hard a leap is it? For some reason it seems oblivious to non-sufferers that the idea of a physical treatment for a mental ailment is a given? For most folks, that connection doesn't exist. Hell, I work out 3x a week and even I don't notice the obvious side-effects even though I'm certain they exist. When we're dealing with ordinary people living their daily lives, the idea that something so "non-mental"…

> Sorry. But I'm an avid gym-goer and even I have to remind myself of the positive it's doing. We're not all the same.

Maybe you're one of the people that for whatever reason exercise does nothing to - though I highly doubt it. I'm not sure what training you do exactly but to reap most of the benefits the workout should include moderate cardio work. I don't think going to lift weights for a 40-60 minutes with plenty of rest between sets will cut it. Running for 45+ minutes is what most people should aim for, of course beginners will do less.

Anyway I agree with you - for most folks the connection doesn't exist, perhaps its time this changed.

Re: Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

#246

Post by throwaway2037 »

dailykoder wrote: post #195
snemvalts wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead, people try to fix it with antidepressants, benzodiazepines or something else. It feels a bit like the US approach to pain management – instead of massages or physical therapy, some opioid pill is cheaper to prescribe.

I dislike this black n white rhetoric from both sides. "Just do some workout" - "no this doesn't work for me". Yes, workout does help, but mental illness is still real. Both sides should try to be more sensitive and more understanding in my opinion. I can't fix my social anxiety through workout. But I sure can feel better about myself when doing it and then approach those anxieties with more confidence, but the anxie…

    > my social anxiety
I am considering trying some beta blockers. Did you try them? They seem like an interesting experiement.

Re: Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

#247

Post by milch »

rhplus wrote: post #159
mvkel wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You should know that vo2 measurements that aren't performed via gas exchange or blood measurement are a complete guess. The other thing is the denominator of vo2 is weight. So losing weight without working out at all will increase vo2

It really doesn’t matter for most amateurs trying to improve their health whether the metric is accurate or not. The huge benefit of fitness trackers is that a metric is a metric is a metric. Eat less, exercise more, sleep soundly - you can’t go wrong, and if the metric is steps, or HR, or pace, or calories burned, or (in this case) estimated VO2max and seeing improvements in those metrics relative to a baseline is a…

The problem with the VO2max metric is that there is no measurement of it outside of a few lab methods, certainly not in a fitness tracker, so they're estimating. It makes more sense to look at the other metrics that it CAN easily measure, like heart rate recovery to get a quantifiable and repeatable measurement. I agree for amateurs accuracy is not necessary, but repeatability is. If I weigh myself today and the scale says 10 lbs below my actual weight, and tomorrow it's 10lbs above my actual weight that's a problem. If it's always 10lbs below that's fine, the delta will be correct. You can't say that for VO2max you get out of a fitness tracker.

My watch says my VO2max is 36.8 which would put me very strongly in the long term negative health effects bucket and well below average. Meanwhile Garmin claims it's 51 which would put me in the top 15% of my age group. It can't be both. They're just made up estimations, and following them blindly could be dangerous. What if someone's is going up even though they're not actually doing a healthy amount of exercise? Or someone's is going down or maintaining even though they are, causing them to fall into negative thought or behavioral patterns? Better to stick with some other data points

Re: Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

#248

Post by throwaway2037 »

Mathnerd314 wrote: post #123

The relationship isn't linear, you can see in https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/54/20/1195#sec-16 that above 2200 MET-minutes/week there is increased cancer risk which outweighs the cardiovascular benefits. Now admittedly it is a very weak correlation, and MET measurement is imprecise, but I think it is safe to say that there are risks associated with over-exercising and while being in shape is good, being a ultra-maratho…

    > 2200 MET-minutes/week is about 3 hours of 8mph running per week
Wow, that is a lot of exercise for the average person. That would be 30 mins per day, six days a week. Again, I don't think 99% of people can sustain this for a more than a few months.

Re: Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

#249

Post by Mawr »

bdcravens wrote: post #158
m463 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

reminds me of the bicycle helmet stuff. There was a ted talk that said bicycle helmet laws would kill more people than save. The reasoning was preventing people from riding would also prevent increased fitness, and more lives were lost from that than saved from accidents. EDIT: I think this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07o-TASvIxY

Kind of tacky, but I had a strange "what if" kind of conversation with someone about alcohol. The premise was that more people are born due to drunken sexual encounters than are killed by drunk drivers.

Talk to someone whose father was an alcoholic.

Re: Cardio fitness is a strong, consistent predictor of morbidity and mortality

#250

Post by mikestew »

throwaway2037 wrote: post #230
llm_trw wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's pretty funny seeing people today seethe about the obvious (being unfit is terrible for you) the same way people in the 1970s were seething about the obvious (smoking is bad for you). There is a reason why life expectancy was dropping in the US years before covid hit.

I asked my parents about the "when was smoking viewed as bad for you" bit. They said late 1980s to early 1990s. They said no one thought it was bad for you in the 1970s -- maybe a stinky habit, that is it.

I grew up in the 70s, and that’s hilariously wrong. Cigarettes had warning labels in the 60s, and cigarettes were called “coffin nails” long before that.
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