Effect of a primary health-care-based controlled trial for cardiorespiratory fitness in refugee women

BMC Family Practice

Research Article

Jan Sundquist¹  Sven-Erik Johansson¹  Kristina Sundquist¹  Maria Hagströmer² 

[1] Center for Primary Health Care Research, CRC, Lund University, Malmö, Sweden;Department of Neurobiology, Care Sciences and Society, Division of Physiotherapy, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden;

关键词: Physical Activity;    Primary Health Care;    Cardiorespiratory Fitness;    Primary Health Care Centre;    Generalize Estimate Equation Model;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1471-2296-11-55

 received in 2010-01-24, accepted in 2010-08-02,  发布年份 2010

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundRefugee women have a high risk of coronary heart disease with low physical activity as one possible mediator. Furthermore, cultural and environmental barriers to increasing physical activity have been demonstrated. The aim of the study was to evaluate the combined effect of an approximate 6-month primary health care- and community-based exercise intervention versus an individual written prescription for exercise on objectively assessed cardiorespiratory fitness in low-active refugee women.MethodsA controlled clinical trial, named "Support for Increased Physical Activity", was executed among 243 refugee women recruited between November 2006 and April 2008 from two deprived geographic areas in southern Stockholm, Sweden. One geographic area provided the intervention group and the other area the control group. The control group was on a higher activity level at both baseline and follow-up, which was taken into consideration in the analysis by applying statistical models that accounted for this. Relative aerobic capacity and fitness level were assessed as the two main outcome measures.ResultsThe intervention group increased their relative aerobic capacity and the percentage with an acceptable fitness level (relative aerobic capacity > 23 O2ml·kg·min-1) to a greater extent than the control group between baseline and the 6-month follow-up, after adjusting for possible confounders (P = 0.020).ConclusionsA combined primary health-care and community-based exercise programme (involving non-profit organizations) can be an effective strategy to increase cardiorespiratory fitness among low-active refugee women.Trial RegistrationClinicalTrials.gov ID: NCT00747942

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© Sundquist et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2010