| Popis: |
Introduction: Vascular endothelial growth factor is essential for health of vascular wall integrity and vasomotor tone and sedentary postmenopausal women suffer from vascular endothelial dysfunction and have a higher risk of cardiovascular disease Objective: The aim of this study was to evaluate the effect of a 8-week exercise training on plasma concentration of vascular endothelial growth factor and its relationship with blood pressure in postmenopausal women. Method: twenty four postmenopausal women [mean age of 67.85±5.67 years, height of 153.50±7.70 cm, weight of 66.16±11.96 kg, BMI of 28.15±4.98] were purposefully selected and randomly divided into two control [n=12] and experimental [n=12] groups. The experimental group performed eight weeks of aerobic training with 60-70% of maximum heart rate three days a week. The level of vascular endothelial growth factor at rest as well as systolic and diastolic blood pressure was measured and recorded before and after eight weeks of training. Paired t-test was used to evaluate intra group variance, independent t-test to assess inter group variance. Results: The results showed that 8-week exercise training significantly [p=0.026] reduce plasma concentration of vascular endothelial growth factor in post-menopausal women. In addition, aerobic training significantly reduced the systolic [p=0.04] and diastolic [p=0.001] blood pressure in postmenopausal women. However, there was no significant correlation between concentration of vascular endothelial growth factor with systolic and diastolic blood pressure. Conclusion: It seems that a period of 8-week exercise training is effective in reduction of blood pressure as well as concentration of plasma vascular endothelial growth factor [cardiovascular disease risk factors], in postmenopausal women. KEYWORDS: Aerobic Training, Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor, Postmenopausal Women, Elderly |
