People who have bigger muscles might have a better chance to have a longer life compared to others who don’t. A recent study in Japan has found that lifting weights at the gym or event lifting heavy weights while being in the house for about 30 minutes in a week, cuts the risk of early death by fifth. Some of the earlier studies had shown that building muscles is linked to low risk of death, but then the scientists and researchers did not know about the actual dose.
The research was conducted by the scientists at the Tohoku University Graduate School of Medicine, who found that training the muscles for 30 to 60 minutes every week cuts the risk of death from heart diseases, cancer and diabetes by 10 to 20 percent. When this is combined with aerobic exercises, the risk can drop further by 40 percent. However, people who are not fond of going to the gym, the scientists have also recommended that this could be compensated at home by heavy gardening activities that counts towards the strength training sessions or doing pushups. But the interesting part here is that working out more than this does not cut the risk any further.
For the study figures, the researchers thoroughly analyzed the research database that included adults without major health issues and were monitored for anywhere between 2 to 25 years. Nearly 16 studies were analysed and the earliest was published nearly ten years back. Majority of the studies were carried out in the United States and the rest were undertaken in United Kingdom, Japan and Australia.
The participants of the study ranged between 18 to 97 the number of people, who participated in everyb study was from 4,000 to nearly 500,000. The study showed that muscle training was linked to a lower risk of death from stroke, heart diseases, cancer, diabetes and lung cancer. But no link was found between muscle training and some of the forms of cancer including kidney, bowel, bladder and pancreatic.
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