People who only exercise on weekends have a similar risk of developing mild dementia to those who work out more frequently, a new study has found.
Weekend warriors who engage in one or two sessions of exercise a week were the focus of the research, published online Tuesday in the British Journal of Sports Medicine.
A team of academics from Latin America and Europe set out to determine whether the frequency of exercise affects the risk of developing mild dementia.
Researchers found that not only was the weekend pattern of keeping fit potentially as effective in staving off the condition, but that it may also be easier for people with busy lifestyles to achieve.
The scientists examined two sets of survey data from the Mexico City Prospective Study, a longitudinal study that followed the health of thousands of people in the Mexican capital over many years. The initial survey took place between 1998 and 2004, and the second, which resurveyed the same people, started in 2015 and ended four years later.
In total, 10,033 people, with an average age of 51, took part in the surveys, and their responses were included in the study.
In the first survey, participants were asked whether they exercised, how often they did so and for how long.
Based on their answers, the researchers divided the respondents into four groups: those who didn’t exercise at all; the weekend warriors who either played sport or exercised once or twice a week; the regularly active, who worked out at least three times a week; and a combined group of regularly active people and weekend warriors.
In the second survey, respondents’ cognitive function was assessed using the Mini Mental State Examination, which, according to the study, is “probably the most widely used tool to screen for cognitive impairment and dementia in older adults.”
Similar results for men and women
The researchers found that the weekend exercisers were 13% less likely to develop mild cognitive impairment than those who didn’t exercise at all, while the regularly active and those in the combined group were 12% less likely to do so. The results were similar for both men and women.
The finding led the team to conclude that 13% of cases of mild dementia could be avoided if all middle-aged people exercised at least once or twice a week.
Lead author Gary O’Donovan, an adjunct professor at the School of Medicine at Colombia’s University of the Andes, told CNN that around half of the weekend warriors reported exercising for at least 30 minutes per session, while the rest exercised for about an hour or more each time.
When compared with the group that did not exercise, the weekend warriors were 13% less likely to develop mild dementia, and those in the regular and combined groups were 12% less likely. O’Donovan said that these are “average values” and that the “margins of error overlap.” In other words, he said, “there are similar reductions in risk in the groups.”