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Exercise Helps Vessels after Heart Attack, but Benefits Vanish when Work-outs Stop

Aerobic exercise, resistance training and both together safely improved blood vessel (or endothelial) function after heart attack, but quitting training quickly caused the improvements to lapse, according to a new study reported in Circulation: Journal of the American Heart Association.

“While it is generally accepted that exercise training for people with coronary artery
disease improves vascular function, controversy still exists regarding the right level and right
format of exercise,” said Margherita Vona, M.D., lead author of the study and a cardiologist
and director of the Cardiac Rehabilitation Center, Clinique Valmont-Genolier in Glion sur
Montreux, Switzerland.
Researchers assessed the effect of different types of exercise, as well as the effect of
stopping exercise in 209 people who’d had heart attacks. They measured participants’
endothelial function at the start of the study and after four weeks of training. Participants then
quit their training for one month and researchers measured blood vessel function again.
The researchers randomly assigned the patients to receive aerobic training, resistance
training, aerobic and resistance training combined, or no training:
· The aerobics participants underwent moderate training four times a week for a month.
Each session included a 10-minute warm-up, 40 minutes of cycling at an intensity of 75
percent of maximum heart rate and a 10-minute cool-down.
· The resistance training group did four sets of 10 resistance exercises repeated 10–12
times, for a total of 40 exercises four times a week for four weeks — a controlled,
moderate-intensity training as recommended by the American Heart Association’s
guidelines for resistance training.
· The combined group alternated controlled resistance and controlled aerobic training
sessions.
The endothelial function of those in the three exercise groups improved after four weeks of
exercise, regardless of the type of exercise, researchers said. The endothelial function on the
non-exercising group, however, did not improve significantly.
Researchers used flow-mediated dilation (FMD) to measure blood vessel function.
After one month of training, FMD increased from about 4 percent before the exercise
programs, to about 10 percent (which is normal function) in trained patients. Researchers
found no significant change in the non-training group (FMD increased from 4.3 percent to 5.1
percent).
However, after one month of detraining, or stopping regular exercise, all the positive
effects on endothelial function were lost. Thus, long-term adherence to training programs is
necessary to maintain vascular benefits on endothelial function, Vona said.