Each year, millions of women deal with a type of debilitating pain called fibromyalgia.
With no known cure, most women deal with years of pain, fatigue, and even depression.
Now there may be a new way to reduce the pain it causes, say researchers.
According to new research published in the health journal Arthritis Care & Research, women with fibromyalgia who had more strength and cardiovascular ability experienced the lowest amounts of pain and fatigue. In contrast, women who were deemed sedentary often had higher levels of chronic pain.
Both strength and cardiovascular ability are enhanced by a strength training and aerobics regimen.
“Our exploratory analyses suggest that muscle strength and flexibility could be the fitness components most strongly associated with pain levels, while aerobic fitness and flexibility could be the fitness components most strongly associated with the psychological experience (i.e. catastrophizing and self-efficacy) of pain,” says Alberto Soriano-Maldonada, BSc, a biomedicine doctoral candidate at the University of Granada’s physical education and sport department in Spain. “Other research has shown equal reductions in pain severity with both strength and aerobic training.
Researchers initially came across these findings after studying a group of female fibromyalgia patients from Andalusia, a southern region in Spain. With a mean age of 52.1 years and a BMI of 28.6, these women were considered overweight.
To see if their fitness levels correlated with their ability to tolerate pain, researchers first asked them to abstain from taking pain medication for 24 hours, having them go through a series of tests. The first test measured how much pain they could tolerate and how they dealt with it, whereas the second tested their fitness capabilities, looking at both muscular and cardiovascular strength.
From there, researchers compared their scores.
The result? Those who had higher fitness capabilities were the least likely to score high on pain tests. This meant that being in shape helped reduce the severity of their fibromyalgia.
“In general, there was a linear (dose-response) relationship so that higher levels of fitness were associated with lower levels of pain and catastrophizing and higher self-efficacy,” write researchers in the online version of Arthritis Care & Research. “Thus, it might be speculated that increasing tissue oxygenation as a result of aerobic exercise could potentially diminish peripheral and central sensitization and reduce clinical pain.”
So if you aren’t already, it’s time to live an active lifestyle–especially if you have fibromyalgia.
What This Means For You
While fibromyalgia may have no cure, this doesn’t mean you have to live with the pain, say Spanish researchers. To lower the amount of pain you experience, simply increase your strength and cardiovascular exercise, whether that’s finding more time to stay physically active throughout the way or adopting a fitness regimen. The best workouts? Simple weightlifting and walking both help address these issues in a jiffy, say health experts.
Readers: What is your current fitness routine?
Source:
Workout May Ease Pain in Women With Fibromyalgia – MedPageToday.com
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