Older Adults Are Not Walking Enough

Main Category: Seniors / Aging
Also Included In: Sports Medicine / Fitness;  Psychology / Psychiatry;  Mental Health
Article Date: 19 Jul 2007 - 1:00 PDT

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Care staff could improve older psychiatric inpatients' physical health and general well-being by encouraging them to walk more.

This is the finding of Brendon Stubbs and Samantha Cooper-Evans, from St Andrews Healthcare who presented their research at the British Psychological Society's PSIGE Annual Conference on Thursday 5 July 2007 being held at the University of Nottingham.

The physical health benefits of walking are well established. Walking has been shown to have a positive impact on mental and physical health in the general population. Relatively few studies have investigated the potential benefits of increased walking amongst older adult mental health patients, despite previous research highlighting that individuals with severe and enduring mental illness are at a much higher risk of a variety of physical ailments (National Institute Clinical Excellence guidelines) and hence in particular need of the health benefits of walking.

To ascertain whether raising awareness of the health benefits of walking amongst patients and staff would have a positive impact on activity levels 52 older adult psychiatric inpatients were recruited (40 males 12 females); aged between 51-85. Each patient was given a pedometer to measure their walking initially over three consecutive days. In the ensuing month staff and patients embarked on a variety of health promotion activities focussing on the health benefits of walking. Following this, the amount of walking each patient did was re-measured.

The results showed that the mean amount of walking increased from 2365 to 3372 steps. This suggests that educating staff and patients on the benefits of walking can have a positive impact on levels of activity and encourage healthy ageing.

Brendon Stubbs said: "To improve physical and mental health of older adults in psychiatric care we need to encourage them to be more active. Staff could certainly have a pivotal role to play in promoting healthy ageing for all older adults by encouraging them to walk more and educating them about the benefits of doing so. This is of particular importance amongst people whose mental health problems prevents them from being able to respond independently to information about the health benefits of walking. Simple changes in routines can make a big difference in increasing the amount of walking for all older adults and can ultimately promote improved independence and quality of life."

British Psychological Society