The purpose of this study was to evaluate the impact of a 5 week program
of aquatic exercise on selected cardiorespiratory parameters in the elderly
participant. Fifteen men and women (mean age 68.5 years, range 61-75 years)
were recruited voluntarily from regional adult day-care and community centre
facilities. Participants underwent a series of physiological tests before
the program started and 5 weeks later at the end of the program.
Measurements included height, weight, spirometry measurements (FVC, FEV¹ֹ⁰, VEmax), resting blood pressure, resting heart rate, exercise heart rate and VO₂max as determined by a continuous treadmill test (modified after Jones and Campbell, 1982).
Following the 5 week aquatic exercise program, the experimental group
(n = 8) showed a significant decrease in resting systolic blood pressure
(SBPR) (EXPTL:131.5<CTRL:133.4 mmHg) and resting heart rate (HR rest)
(EXPTL:71.0<CTRL:76.6 btsּmin⁻¹) in comparison to the control group (n = 7)
which exhibited no change. In addition, the experimental group yielded a
significant increase in forced expiratory volume (FEV¹ֹ⁰)
(EXPTL:2.4>CTRL:2.2 1ּsec⁻¹) and maximal oxygen uptake (VO₂max )
(EXPTL:25.8>CTRL:23.5 mlּkg⁻¹ּmin⁻¹ ) in comparison to the control group.
The findings in this study indicate that the exercise capacity of the elderly participant can increase with aquatic exercise: supervised aquatic exercise at or above the recommended intensity of exercise performed three times weekly can produce significant changes in the physical work capacity of the elderly / Education, Faculty of / Curriculum and Pedagogy (EDCP), Department of / Graduate
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UBC/oai:circle.library.ubc.ca:2429/28536 |
| Date | January 1988 |
| Creators | Jessop, Darrell James |
| Publisher | University of British Columbia |
| Source Sets | University of British Columbia |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text, Thesis/Dissertation |
| Rights | For non-commercial purposes only, such as research, private study and education. Additional conditions apply, see Terms of Use https://open.library.ubc.ca/terms_of_use. |
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