PROTIME-FITNESS HOLISTIC HEALTH AND WELLNESS

  Moderate muscle strength may lower risk for type 2 diabetes Of the 30 million Americans with diabetes, 90 to 95 percent have type 2, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. New research shows building muscle strength may be one way to lower risk for the disease. The study of more than 4,500 adults found moderate muscle mass reduced the risk for type 2 diabetes by 32 percent. The benefits were independent of cardiorespiratory fitness, and higher levels of muscle strength did not provide additional protection. The findings are published in the journal  Mayo Clinic Proceedings . DC (Duck-chul) Lee, associate professor of kinesiology at Iowa State University and corresponding author of the study, says the results are encouraging because even small amounts of resistance exercise may help prevent type 2 diabetes by improving muscle strength. However, it is difficult to recommend an optimal level as there are no standardized muscle strength measurements, he sai...

  STRENGTH TRAINING IS EFFECTIVE AT ANY AGE.         After specific training for 12 weeks, people over the age of 90 improved their strength, power, and muscle mass. This was reflected in an increase in their walking speed, a greater capacity to get out of their chairs, an improvement in their balance, a significant reduction in the incidence of falls, and a significant improvement in muscle power and mass in the lower limbs. These are some of the study outcomes recently published in the journal  Age  of the American Aging  Association ,  which was led by Mikel Izquierdo-Redín, Professor of Physiotherapy at the NUP/UPNA-Public University of Navarre. 2 4 people between 91 and 96 participated in the research, with 11 in the experimental group and 13 in the control group. Two days a week over 12 weeks, they underwent multicomponent training, which included a program of various exercises designed specifically for them, as well as combined strengt...

  INTENSE STAIR CLIMBING: BOOSTS FITNESS There are no more excuses for being out of shape. Researchers at McMaster University have found that short, intense bursts of stair climbing, which can be done virtually anywhere, have significant benefits for heart health. The findings negate the two most common excuses for not exercising: no time and no access to the gym. "Stair climbing is a form of exercise anyone can do in their own home, after work or during the lunch hour," says Martin Gibala, a professor of kinesiology at McMaster and lead author on the study. "This research takes interval training out of the lab and makes it accessible to everyone." Previous studies have proven the benefits of vigorous stair climbing over sustained periods -- up to 70 minutes a week --. Still, scientists set out to determine if sprint interval training (SIT), which involves brief bursts of vigorous exercise separated by short periods of recovery, was an effective and time-efficient a...

  High-intensity interval training rapidly improves diabetics' glucose metabolism. New research reveals that high-intensity interval training (HIIT) increases glucose metabolism in muscles and insulin sensitivity in type 2 diabetes. Already after a two-week training period, the glucose uptake in thigh muscles returned to a normal level. The discovery was made in a research project led by Senior Research Fellow Kari Kalliokoski and Project Manager Jarna Hannukainen at the University of Turku, Finland. The project studied the health impacts of high-intensity interval training on healthy people and diabetics, and the results are encouraging. "HIIT has a rapid impact on metabolism. However, no great differences have been demonstrated between the impact of HIIT and moderate-intensity continuous training over a longer period of time. The main benefit of high-intensity interval training is mostly that it takes less time," says Doctoral Candidate Tanja Sjöros. In the study, healt...

  The world-first study links obesity with reduced brain plasticity. A world-first study has found that severely overweight people are less likely to re-wire their brains and find new neural pathways, a discovery that has significant implications for people recovering from a stroke or brain injury. In a new paper published in  Brain Sciences , researchers from UniSA and Deakin University show that brain plasticity is impaired in obese people, making it less likely to learn new tasks or remember things. Using a series of experiments involving transcranial magnetic stimulation, the researchers tested 15 obese people between 18 and 60, comparing them with 15 people in a healthy-weight control group. Repeated pulses of electrical stimulation were applied to the brain to see how strongly it responded. The healthy-weight control group recorded significant neural activity in response to the stimulation, suggesting a normal brain plasticity response. In contrast, the obese group's res...

   BRAIN INSULIN SENSITIVITY Just where fat is deposited in the body and to what degree a person may benefit from a lifestyle intervention depends, among other things, on how sensitive the brain is to insulin. If the person's brain responds sensitively to the hormone, a significant amount of weight can be lost, unhealthy visceral fat is reduced, and the weight loss can be maintained over the long term. However, if the person's brain responds only slightly or not to insulin, the person only loses some weight at the beginning of the intervention and then experiences weight regain. Over the long term, the visceral fat also increases. These are the results of a long-term study by the German Center for Diabetes Research (DZD), Helmholtz Zentrum München, and Tübingen University Hospital, which has now been published in  Nature Communications . The extent to which body fat has an unhealthy effect depends primarily on where it is stored. If fat accumulates in the abdomen, this is...

  Why is visceral fat worse than subcutaneous fat? Researchers have long-known that visceral fat -- the kind that wraps around the internal organs -- is more dangerous than subcutaneous fat that lies just under the skin around the belly, thighs, and rear. But how visceral fat contributes to insulin resistance and inflammation has remained unknown. A study led by researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago points blames at a regulatory molecule in cells called TRIP-Br2 that are produced in response to overeating's stress on the machinery cells to use to produce proteins. The findings are published in the journal  Nature Communications . All body fat is not created equal in terms of associated health risks. Visceral fat is strongly linked to metabolic disease and insulin resistance, and an increased risk of death, even for people who have a normal body mass index. Subcutaneous fat doesn't carry the same risks -- some subcutaneous fat may even be protective. In previous ...