Walking Helps Weakened Lungs

Exercise good for chronic pulmonary condition

By Ed Edelson
HealthScoutNews Reporter

TUESDAY, Jan. 28 (HealthScoutNews) -- Exercise is good for people with the lung-destroying condition called chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a Spanish study finds.

COPD patients who did the equivalent of one hour's walking every day had about half the risk of being hospitalized than physically inactive patients, says a report in the February issue of Thorax. The research was done by Judith Garcia-Aymerich and her colleagues at the Municipal Unit of Medical Investigation in Barcelona.

"Of course, we were surprised for such a finding," Garcia-Aymerich says. "In fact, we would have expected the inverse association."

COPD is a combination of lung diseases, mainly emphysema and chronic bronchitis, often caused by smoking, which obstructs airflow into the lungs. It gets progressively worse, with periodic flare-ups that require hospitalization. While it gets relatively little attention, it is the fourth leading cause of death in the United States.

In the study, the researchers monitored 304 men with COPD for just over one year -- a year in which 63 percent of them were hospitalized at least once and 29 percent of them died.

Checking out the various factors in medical treatment and lifestyle, the researchers found that the most important factor that reduced the chance of hospitalization was physical activity. One third of the patients reported daily physical activity that burned the calories exerted in at least one hour of walking, and their rate of hospitalization was 46 percent that of the more inactive patients.

"This is the first study to show a strong association between physical activity and risk of readmission to hospital with COPD, which is potentially relevant for rehabilitation and other therapeutic strategies," the journal report says.

COPD patients are routinely told to exercise but many of them don't because of the breathing problems and fatigue caused by the condition, Garcia-Aymerich says. The need to exercise "can be easily forgotten in the middle of the enormous need of health attention that COPD patients have," she says.

The study results are a bit surprising to Dr. William C. Bailey, a professor of medicine and head of the lung health center at the University of Alabama, but only because "that little exercise produced that much benefit."

"Otherwise, it is consistent with what we know, that pulmonary rehabilitation increases the quality of life," Bailey says. Pulmonary rehabilitation, he explains, is simply an exercise program under the supervision of nurses or other health personnel, and the study results "increase the stimulus to refer people to such a program."

One problem in giving the benefits of a rehabilitation program to COPD patients in the United States is money, Bailey says. Medical insurance generally will cover only one rehabilitation program, for a fixed period or until the patient has to stop because he or she goes into the hospital.

"One hospitalization and you lose all the benefits," he says.

More information

You can get an overview of COPD from the American Lung Association and some guidance on how to exercise from the American Association for Respiratory Care.

SOURCES: Judith Garcia-Aymerich, Ph.D., Municipal Unit of Medical Investigation, Barcelona, Spain; William C. Bailey, M.D., professor, medicine, University of Alabama, Birmingham; February 2003 Thorax

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