The Effect of 8 Weeks Aerobic Training on Predictive Inflammatory Markers of Atherosclerosis and Lipid Profile in Obese Elderly Women

Cardiovascular diseases especially atherosclerosis, are the main causative of disability and death in all over the world and they have increasing spread in Iran. Homocysteine and fibrinogen are two new risk factors for prediction of atherosclerosis. Considering this, our aim in this study was to evaluate the effect of 8 weeks aerobic training on serum predictive inflammatory markers of atherosclerosis and lipid profile in obese elderly women.
In a quasiexperimental study, 44 obese women (BMI≥30) 55 to 65 years old as volunteer, were selected and randomly divided into two groups of experiment (22 individuals) and control (22 individuals). Training program included aerobic exercise with 45 to 65 percent of maximum heart rate for 1 hour per session and 3session per week and continued for 8 weeks. Blood samples were collected after 12 hours fasting in the pretest and 48 hours in the post-test to measure homocysteine, fibrinogen, high-sensitivity protein (CRP) and lipid profile.
Findings: Present study data shows that a significant decrease was observed in
homocysteine (p=0.004), hs-CRP (p=0.009), cholesterol (p=0.037), triglyceride (p=0.017) and LDL-C (p=0.047) levels in experimental group; while there wasnt significant relation between study variability in control group. Also, a significant difference was observed in comparison between control and experimental groups about homocysteine (p=0.000), hs-CRP (p=0.037), cholesterol (p=0.049), triglyceride (p=0.000) and LDLC (p=0.012). There was a significant relation between body fat percentage(r=0.87) and body mass index(r=0.68) with homocysteine.
Discussion & To sum up, by losing weight and body fat, homocysteine, CRP and also the increase of HDL study results showed that 8 week aerobic training can lead to reduction of cardiovascular risk factors and improving the health status in the elderly women.