Cardiovascular disease risk factors associated with low level of physical activity in postmenopausal Polish women

Abstract

Objectives: To determine whether physical activity level could have an effect on cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factors in Polish postmenopausal women.

Methods: We studied the associations of physical activity (PA) level with obesity indices, unfavorable lipid profile parameters and the insulin resistance index HOMA in 343 postmenopausal Polish women selected from an urban population, aged 50–60.

Results: In the tested sample, a low level of PA significantly increased odds ratios for CVD risk factors such as BMI ≥ 30 kg/m², total body fat (TBF) > 75th percentile, gynoid fat deposit (GFD) > 75th percentile, total cholesterol (TC) ≥ 5 mM, low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) > 3 mM and HOMA ≥ 1.95.

Conclusions: Obesity and some metabolic CVD risk factors in postmenopausal women are directly associated with low PA level. Postmenopausal urban women should be persuaded to be physically active, as even moderate activity level seems to be sufficient to reduce the CVD risk in this group of individuals.

• CVD risk factors
• physical activity level
• postmenopausal women

Acknowledgments

This study was supported by grant No. 2PO5D 00428 of the Ministry of Scientific Research and Information Technology in Poland.