How’s your stair-pace? At what point must you STOP to catch your breath?
This article says:
For the study, 12,615 participants with known or suspected coronary artery disease underwent treadmill exercise echocardiography — a medical test to see how well a person’s heart tolerates activity.
WHAT IS A METABOLIC EQUIVALENT?
Their effort levels were measured in metabolic equivalents, or METs. One MET is equal to the energy it takes to sit quietly. Walking briskly requires about 3 METs, while jogging takes more than 6. This study defined good functional capacity as achieving a maximum workload of 10 METs.
Being able to climb four flights of stairs in about 45-55 seconds would be equivalent to 10 METs, Peteiro, estimated.
When the study participants were followed up over the next five years or so, each MET they achieved during the exercise test was associated with a 9 percent lower risk of cardiovascular death, a 9 percent lower risk of cancer death and 4 percent lower risk of other causes of death, the European Society of Cardiology noted.
In people with poor functional capacity, the death rate from heart disease was almost three times higher and cancer deaths were almost double compared to participants who had good exercise capacity.
[…]
Dr. Andrew Freeman [is the] director of cardiovascular prevention and wellness at National Jewish Health in Denver, Colorado, and a member of the American College of Cardiology’s Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease Section Leadership Council.
Freeman was not involved in the new study, but said it would encourage him even more to push his patients to exercise regularly and vigorously.
He recommended 30 minutes a day of “breathlessness.”
“When people say, ‘I can’t exercise because I’m short of breath,’ I say, ‘Great, what a wonderful thing, I want you to use that your advantage,’” Freeman said. “I want you to warm up and get right to that point where you’re breathless — not passing out, but challenged. And I want you to stay there for as long as you can. Take a break when you need to and then resume.”
https://www.today.com/health/how-live-longer-stair-test-may-predict-longevity-death-risk-t144556
