International Journal of Physical Medicine & Rehabilitation
Open Access

Abstract

Association between Walking Exercise and Physical Function: In Community-Dwelling Older People

Tsubasa Yokote and Hiro Kishimoto*

Preventing frailty, sarcopenia, and locomotive syndrome is an important public health issue. Walking exercise has been recommended for the prevention of several diseases and to increase physical activity. We conducted a narrative review of the association between walking exercise and physical function in older community-dwelling individuals in a systematic search of the MEDLINE database for studies in English and CiNii articles in Japanese, published in 2004– 2020. Twenty-five papers were extracted. Our analyses revealed that walking exercise was related to comprehensive physical function, muscle strength, gait speed, physical balance, and exercise capacity. Further investigations are needed to determine the independent associations between walking exercise and frailty, sarcopenia, and locomotive syndrome and to explore the optimal type, frequency, time, duration, and intensity of walking exercise.

Published Date: 2021-06-23; Received Date: 2021-06-02