There’s more proof that exercise can help people with arthritis stay fit enough to perform everyday tasks like cooking, dressing and bathing.
In a two-year study of more than 5,700 adults with arthritis age 65 and older, researchers at Northwestern University in Chicago found that the sedentary adults were twice as likely to have to limit their movements because of arthritis than the active participants.
Exercising more—by gardening, swimming or walking—could prevent a good deal of physical decline in people with arthritis, lead author Dorothy Dunlop, M.D., of the Feinberg School of Medicine at Northwestern wrote in the April issue of Arthritis & Rheumatism. Other research has found exercise can also help ease the joint pain caused by arthritis. —AARP Bulletin June, 2005
