Climbing stairs regularly reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease

Just a few small steps up the stairs is a big step for cardiovascular health. That's the result of a new review from Great Britain that examined data from hundreds of thousands of people. Accordingly, regular climbing stairs could be associated with a significantly lower risk of heart attacks, strokes and heart failure.

Researchers from Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital and Norwich Medical School in the United Kingdom evaluated nine studies involving a total of more than 480,000 patients, including people both with and without diagnosed cardiovascular disease. The participants were between 35 and 84 years old and were followed for an average of 14 years. Just over half of them were female.

"Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death worldwide - cases have doubled between 1990 and 2019," said one of the study's lead authors, Vassilios Vassiliou of Norwich Medical School at the University of East Anglia, in a press release. The study was published in the “American Journal of Cardiovascular Drugs”.

Cardiovascular diseases are largely preventable, for example through a healthy lifestyle. This includes regular physical activity such as sport, a balanced diet, avoiding cigarettes, a healthy body weight and keeping an eye on blood pressure, cholesterol levels and diabetes. But in everyday life, very few people have the time and nerve to train extensively in the gym or to ensure an ideal diet.

“Using the stairs is a practical and often overlooked way to incorporate physical activity into daily life,” Vassiliou said. “We wanted to better understand the extent to which such daily exercise has the potential to save lives.”

The results of the new study are impressive: those who regularly used the stairs had a 39 percent lower risk of dying from heart disease and were significantly less likely to develop serious cardiovascular diseases. At the same time, the overall risk of death for these people was reduced by 24 percent compared to people who rarely climbed stairs. In order to do something good for your health, you don't need a sophisticated training plan.

“Even short moments of physical activity can have positive health effects, and a small amount of stair climbing should be an achievable goal in your daily routine,” said Vassiliou. "So if you have a choice between taking the stairs or the elevator, choose the stairs. It will help your heart."

A previous study cited in the paper showed that climbing stairs for just a few minutes several times a week can increase cardiovascular fitness and reduce cholesterol levels.

A large cohort study, which was also included in the current analysis, found that an optimum of six flights of stairs per day had the greatest effect. However, further research is needed here.

Despite the encouraging results, scientists caution that these recommendations are not suitable for everyone. Anyone who has knee or other joint problems should not put too much strain on them.