Physical training decreases waist circumference in postmenopausal borderline overweight women

Objective. To examine if healthy borderline overweight postmenopausal women with osteoporosis can improve their waist circumference and lipid profile with a moderate physical training program. Design. Randomized controlled trial. Setting. One hundred and twelve postmenopausal women were randomized to normal sedentary life or one year of physical training consisting of three brisk walks and 1-2 aerobic exercises/week. Main Outcome Measures. Waist circumference reduction, waist circumference reduction in relation to observed level of participation in physical intervention and changes in cholesterol, triglycerides, apolipoproteins B and A1 and high-sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP). Results. At start the mean (SD) waist circumference was 83.6 (7.7) and 81.8 (7.5) cm in the control and training groups, respectively. In relation to baseline, the 12 months intervention led to a waist reduction of 0.3 cm (2.7) (p=0.36) and 1.6 cm (4.7) (p=0.02) in the respective groups but the inter-group comparison was not significant in an intention-to-treat analysis (p=0.09). The ninety-two women completing the study intervention were analyzed per protocol. A tendency for better waist reduction in relation to the women's observed physical intensity level was observed (p=0.07, ANOVA for linear trend across training intensity levels). Training women improved their waist circumference 1.7 cm (p=0.01) compared to baseline and was borderline significantly better than controls (p=0.059). No significant changes in response to the intervention were observed for blood pressure, cholesterol, triglycerides, apolipoproteins and hs-CRP. Conclusions. A moderate physical exercise program for healthy postmenopausal women during one year reduced the waist circumference in a training intensity dependent manner.