Runners Still Rock

ACTIVE Americans do not wear out, but sedentary ones are likely to rust out, according to the findings of an eight-year study of nearly 800 people 50 and over. As they age, the study showed, those who regularly engage in vigorous aerobic exercise like running are much less likely to develop life-inhibiting disabilities.

The study, conducted by a research team from Stanford University and published in the current issue of Annals of Internal Medicine, followed the health of 451 members of a runners' club and 330 nonrunners living in the same community. All participants were 50 to 72 when the study began.

"Long-distance running, and presumably other regular aerobic exercise activity, is associated with preservation of good physical function in the later years of life, compared with persons with more sedentary life styles," the researchers concluded. They said their findings underscored the importance of promoting "regular lifetime physical exercise to improve the quality of life of the growing older population."

The study also showed, as have earlier ones, that the runners had a lower death rate than the nonrunners.

As one might suspect, at the time of enrollment the runners were in better shape than the nonrunners. When the study began, runners, who had already been pursuing their chosen activity for an average of 12 years, were leaner, had fewer medical problems and fewer joint symptoms, took fewer medications and were less likely to have experienced previous disability than were the nonrunners.

The researchers, headed by Dr. James F. Fries, a specialist in arthritis, suggested that the initial health differences could be the result of the previous years of running or it could reflect the fact that people in good shape initially are more likely to choose to be vigorously active. Nonetheless, in following the fates of the two groups of men and women for eight years, the researchers showed that the health differential persisted and further increased, even after taking the participants' initial health status into account.

The nonrunners, both men and women, were several times more likely to develop some form of disability during the eight-year period. This health difference persisted even when the data were adjusted for potential health influences like smoking, body weight, history of arthritis, age, sex and disabilities present when the study began.

"There was but a slight increase in disability in the runners and a substantial increase in the nonrunners during this period," the team reported. By the end of the study, the nonrunners reported three and a half times more disabilities than did the runners. Disability measures included the participants' ability to walk, arise from a straight chair and grip objects.

"These findings underscore the fact that people who are physically active will remain physically fit despite the process of aging and the chronic diseases that can accompany aging," said Dr. Ralph Paffenbarger, a professor of epidemiology at the University of California at Berkeley. "They are another argument for undertaking activities to promote flexibility and strength and to reduce the risk of fatal coronary heart disease and stroke and the risk of developing hypertension, osteoporosis, obesity and noninsulin-dependent diabetes."

To eliminate a possible bias that would result if some people had once been runners but gave it up because of health problems, the researchers divided the participants into "ever runners" and "never runners," and here they found an even greater difference in disability was found between the runners' club members and the entire nonrunning group.

The runners reported less frequent joint pain and swelling than did the nonrunners. But when X-rays of joints were taken of a smaller group of participants in the study, no differences in arthritic changes were found between the runners and nonrunners, suggesting that differences in disability rates were due to factors like improved conditioning and low rates of other health problems like heart disease, rather than a reduced incidence of arthritis.