Culturally Adapted Exercise Program Helps Hispanic Older Adults Be More Active

A new study of 565 Hispanic older adults in the Journal of Applied Gerontology suggests a culturally adapted exercise program has potential for improving their physical functioning, reports the University of Illinois News Bureau . Most participants, who were primarily women, reported having at least two chronic conditions at the outset, with 84 percent overweight or obese, and many exhibiting moderate physical impairment in lower extremities. Participants met weekly for a one-hour group exercise class focused on muscle strength, balance, endurance, and flexibility; they also met once weekly for a group discussion led by a bilingual health educator on either general health topics for the controls or an age-reattribution curricula highlighting physical activity to prevent or diminish aging-affiliated chronic health conditions. "Regardless of whether they were in the treatment group or the control group, participants showed significant improvements in their physical capabilities after 12 and 24 months compared with baseline," noted Brett Burrows with the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Yet the age-reattribution curricula did not apparently bring any additional benefits to treatment group members, like boosting their motivation to stay physically active or changing self-defeating cultural ideas that link aging to poor health. One implication is that Hispanic older adults are willing to pursue recreational physical activities that improve them physically when low-cost, culturally adapted programs are available.