Effects of an Off-Site Walking Program on Fibrinogen and Exercise Energy Expenditure in Women

Walking exercise and lower-body blood flow restriction: Effects on systemic inflammation, lipid profiles and hematological indices in overweight middle-aged males

The objective of present study is to investigate the effects of walk training with and without blood flow restriction (BFR and no-BFR) on lipid profiles, inflammatory and haematological factors in over-weighed men. Participants were divided into BFR (n = 9) or no-BFR (n = 9) groups. Both groups were exposed to 8-week walk training on a treadmill: 3 sessions/week at a speed of 50 m/min, 5 sets × 2 min/session. There were differences in pre- to post-levels of (TG) and fibrinogen in the BFR group (p ≤ 0.05) that were accompanied by changes in red blood cells (RBC), haemoglobin (HGB) and haematocrit (HCT) levels (p ≤ 0.05). RBC levels were increased in the BFR group (p ≤ 0.05). The groups differed in their mean corpuscular volume (MCV) and mean corpuscular haemoglobin concentration (MCHC). These findings suggest the efficiency of BFR walk training in individuals exposed to chronic diseases associated with overweight, such as metabolic syndrome.

Benefits of 10 weeks of high-intensity interval training and green tea supplementation on cardiovascular risk factors and VO2max in overweight women

Background

Considered the increasing rate of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) and a positive relationship between prevalence of CVDs and obesity, the goal of the present study was to investigate the effects of green tea supplement and high-intensity interval training (HIIT) on lipid panel, fibrinogen, and maximal oxygen consumption (VO_2max) in overweight women.

Materials and Methods

In this randomized placebo-controlled clinical trial, 30 overweight women (age range, 20-30 years), were chosen purposefully and randomly divided into three equal groups (green tea, HIIT + green tea, and HIIT + placebo), and they trained HIIT workouts for 10 weeks (40-m maximal shuttle run) and used 500 mg/daily green tea or placebo tablets. Serum levels of low-density lipoprotein (LDL), high-density lipoprotein (HDL), triglyceride (TG), and plasma level of fibrinogen were assessed before and after the intervention in fasting state. To test the hypothesis of the research, Paired t-test, Wilcoxon signed-rank test, analysis of covariance, and Tukey's post hoc tests were used at the significance level of P ≤ 0.05.

Results

After 10 weeks, TG, LDL, weight, fibrinogen, and body fat percentage decreased in all groups (P ≤ 0.05). Further, HDL (P = 0.012) and VO_2max (P = 0.007) significantly increased in HIIT + green tea and HIIT + placebo groups; while in the green tea group, HDL (P = 0.06) and VO_2max (P = 0.06) showed no significant difference for within group differences. Average between-group variations of all indicators were statistically significant, and they were more meaningfully pronounced in HIIT + green tea group than the other two groups (P ≤ 0.05).

Conclusion

Based on the findings, the combination of HIIT and green tea consumption significantly leads to a reduction in weight, body fat percentage, fibrinogen, TG, and LDL while improves VO_2max and HDL levels rather than green tea consumption or performing training alone, in overweight women. However, it seems that exercise training has a vital role in the improvement of mentioned variables according to percentage changes.