How Far Is Too Far?
Let me explain.
You look at yourself in the mirror one day, don’t like what you see and join a gym. The treadmill becomes your friend. This improves your cholesterol levels and lowers your resting heart rate. You (and your doctor) think you are in great health. But these good tests actually conceal the fact that you have clogged coronary arteries. Studies have shown that exercise does not change your life-long risk factors that could be due to hereditary causes. In fact running on a whole lot of atherosclerotic plaque could be fatal.
Endurance exercisers over 50 can die from sudden cardiac events caused by bad stuff called plaque, a deadly combination of cells, cholesterol, fats, and tissue that builds up in arteries. We all have some plaque in our vessels. When in the arteries of the heart, they are most dangerous. Under various conditions, including extreme physical stress, plaque may dislodge from the vessel and cause a traffic jam to the heart or brain, keeping away blood and the vital oxygen it carries. This state of low oxygen would cause pain or angina in most adults.
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Image: Hulton-Deutsch Collection/Corbis
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RACE OF A LIFETIME: Race of a Lifetime A racing clerk assists the Italian runner Dorando Pietri across
the finish line in the 1908 London Olympics marathon. Pietri was first past the post after taking a wrong turning and receiving medical attention for a fall. Although disqualified, he received a gold cup for his efforts from Queen Alexandra | |
However, fitness freaks would have improved collateral circulation that gets blood and oxygen to the heart, concealing the underlying risk. They run on. In fact, majority of sudden deaths occur in the very last mile of a marathon. This is the paradox of endurance exercise: Its greatest benefits could prove to be the deadliest.
A study that analysed cardiac markers of marathon runners before and after a race showed surprising results. The levels of a very specific cardiac marker, troponin T, were shown to increase after running. If you were to run into an emergency room with an elevated troponin T count, that would buy you an immediate visit to the angiography suite. Whether this means that runners are permanently damaging their hearts with each marathon is unclear. Dr. Nader Rifai, Professor at Harvard Medical School and Editor in Chief of the leading journal of Laboratory Medicine, Clinical Chemistry, says, “These elevations may signify cardiac death, but more likely they show cardiac fatigue”.
This is consistent with a recent evaluation of marathon runners that used advanced cardiac imaging along with labs. That study, presented earlier this year at the International Conference of the American Thoracic Society, showed that despite the elevated lab tests, at one week follow-up the runners showed no continued cardiac abnormalities.
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Thanks for your comment. Meditation was mentioned briefly and like yoga, it is very effective for acute stress relief. Both yoga and meditation can moderate stress hormones levels. Based on what we know today, challenge is that they lower stress levels while they are being practiced and for not long after.
Some good studies would really help understand how the effects of holistic interventions can be prolonged. How often should they be done, for how long, etc. The US's National Institute of Health (http://nccam.nih.gov/) has been funding studies in this area for the past decade; many results support the effect of Chinese medicine. India's AYUSH (Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturapathy, Unani, Siddha, and Homeopathy) should take a solid leadership position to establish in the international scientific community the efficacy of some holistic jewels such as yoga and meditation that have come out of India.
Vikram
