Physical activity and mortality: a prospective study among women.
OBJECTIVE
This study examined the association between recreational physical activity and mortality in middle-aged and older women and the possibility that physical activity serves as an important marker of health.


METHODS
Analyses were conducted among participants in the Nurses' Health Study. Levels of physical activity were assessed by questionnaire in 1980 and updated every 2 to 4 years.


RESULTS
Levels of physical activity were inversely associated with mortality risk; however, each activity level above the reference level had approximately the same level of risk reduction (20%-30%). The inverse association was stronger for cardiovascular deaths than for cancer deaths and was strongest for respiratory deaths. Women who died of noncardiovascular, noncancer causes were more likely to have reported that poor health limited their physical activity than were women who died of other causes or who remained alive.


CONCLUSIONS
Part of the link between physical activity and mortality risk is probably spurious and difficult to remove analytically; however, on the basis of epidemiologic evidence, much of the health benefit of activity is real.
Rockhill
B
B
Channing Laboratory, Department of Medicine, Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital, 181 Longwood Ave, Boston, MA 02115, USA. beverly.rockhill@channing.harvard.edu
Willett
W C
WC
Manson
J E
JE
Leitzmann
M F
MF
Stampfer
M J
MJ
Hunter
D J
DJ
Colditz
G A
GA
D000328:Adult; D015331:Cohort Studies; D003625:Data Collection; D015444:Exercise / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D009026:Mortality / Q000639:trends*; D009726:Nurses / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D016387:Women's Health