The benefits of walking are well known, especially for cardiovascular health, maintaining low body weight and reducing stress. Hundreds of surveys have confirmed Hippocrates' quote that "walking is the best medicine".
Especially for people who don't do any other exercise, walking can be "miraculous". Of course, experts recommend that walking should be fast in order to benefit our health.
According to a new study that has seen the light of day, people who walk slowly have a more mature brain and body already at the age of 45.
The study, published in the scientific journal JAMA Network Open, showed that those who walk slower "age faster" and their lungs, teeth and immune systems are worse off than those who walk faster.
Slow walking is a sign of problems
Researcher Lane Rasmussen, who participated in the study, said that the pioneer in this study is that it involved 45-year-olds, that is, people who did not constitute the normal geriatric population.
What was even more surprising, according to her, was that the performance of those undergoing neuropsychological tests were good predictors of future gait speed.
Terry Moffitt, another scientist who was also involved in the study, said previous research has shown that people who walk 70-80 years later tend to die earlier than those who walk faster. As he explained, this time the research covered the period from childhood to middle adulthood and found that slow walking is a sign of problems at these ages as well.
The identity of research
Participants underwent magnetic resonance imaging, and those who walked slower were found to have reduced brain volume, lower mean cortical thickness, lower total cortical area. In addition, they had an increased incidence of white matter intensities, that is, brain lesions depicted on MRI as very bright areas.
In conclusion, the brains of those who walked slowly seemed much older.
"It is a pity we did not measure walking speed and did not conduct magnetic resonance imaging of those involved in the research as a child," the participants said.
The study involved 904 people from New Zealand who were examined for two years when they were 45 years old.
Source:
Lain Jee Rasmussen, Avshalom Caspi et al, (2019), Association of Neurocognitive and Physical Function With Gait Speed in Midlife, Jama Network Open, https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2752818.
By Dr Angel,
Αggeliki Koskeridou
Holistic Doctor – Counseling Psychotherapist
Doctor of Naturopathic Medicine
MSc Health Psychology
insta: dr_aggelikikoskeridou_official