Jan. 6 (UPI) —<\/span> Loss of muscle strength and reduced mobility shortens the lifespan of older women, a study published Thursday by the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society found.<\/p>\n Older women who lost 5% or more of their body weight as they aged, a possible sign of loss of muscle mass, had a 66% higher risk for early death, the data showed.\n<\/p>\n<\/article>\n Conversely, older women who maintained their physical strength lowered their likelihood for an earlier death by as much as 70%, the researchers said.<\/p>\n “Our findings support increasing efforts to improve mobility and muscle strength in older women,” study co-author Dr. Lisa Underland said in a press release.\n<\/p>\n In addition, there should be “less focus on long-term weight loss in this population,” said Underland, a pediatric endocrinologist at the Children’s Hospital at Montefiore in New York City.<\/p>\n Although research suggests that women who are overweight or obese can benefit from weight loss late in life, a concern exists that excessive weight loss could lead to a loss of muscle strength, causing physical frailty and negatively affecting mobility, studies have found.<\/p>\n Older women who lose muscle strength and experience declines in mobility as they age have a shorter lifespan than women\n<\/p>\n For this study, Underland and her colleagues monitored the health of 5,039 older women for an average of nearly 5 1\/2 years.<\/p>\n The participants, with average age of 79 years, were routinely evaluated for hand-grip strength, mobility and other aspects of physical performance, the researchers said.<\/p>\n Participants with higher grip strength had a 50% lower risk for earlier death, the data showed.\n<\/p>\n Those who had better lower extremity functioning had a 70% lower risk for earlier death, the researchers said.<\/p>\n Women who performed better on these measures also had an up to 40% lower risk for developing heart disease and an up to 10% lower risk for suffering a stroke, according to the researchers.<\/p>\n “Both higher physical functioning and higher grip strength were associated with lower mortality and lower risk of cardiovascular events independent of weight change,” the researchers wrote.<\/p>\n “These findings support efforts to improve mobility and muscle strength in older women and suggest that focusing on weight loss in older women needs to be reconsidered,” they said.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Excessive weight loss and reduced muscle strength can lead to earlier death in older women, a new study has found. Photo courtesy of Max Pixel\/Pixabay Jan. 6 (UPI) — Loss of muscle strength and reduced mobility shortens the lifespan of older women, a study published Thursday by the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society found. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":737874,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[371,420,421,422,423,424,425,426,28,427],"class_list":["post-737873","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-death","tag-mobility","tag-muscle","tag-older","tag-raise","tag-reduced","tag-risk","tag-strength","tag-study","tag-women"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/737873","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=737873"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/737873\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=737873"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=737873"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2022\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=737873"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Study:](\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/01\/Study-Reduced-muscle-strength-less-mobility-raise-death-risk-in-older-women.jpg\" "\\"Study:")
\n<\/div>\nExcessive weight loss and reduced muscle strength can lead to earlier death in older women, a new study has found. Photo courtesy of Max Pixel\/Pixabay<\/p>\n