Effects of swimming and resistance training on bone mineral density of older women

Abstract

Impact exercises like walking, jumping, running and resistance exercises are largely used to prevent bone loss in older women; however, few studies report the benefits of swimming to bone tissue. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to compare the effects of swimming with resistance training on bone mineral density (BMD) of older women. Twenty-three women with mean age of 63.9 ± 6.49 years were divided in two groups: 1) Swimming group (SWM, n = 13) trained at intensity between 60 and 90% of heart hate reserve; 2) Resistance training group (RT, n = 10) trained the main muscular groups with three sets at 80% of 1RM. Both groups trained 3 days/week, one hour per session, during six months. Femoral neck and lumbar spine (L2-L3-L4) BMD were assessed by DXA before (T0) and after six months (T6) of training. Results showed that mean BMD at lumbar spine at T0 (0.9250 ± 0.1506g/cm2) and T6 (0.9303 ± 0.1269g/cm2) for SWM, and at T0 (0.9739 ± 0.1249g/cm2) and T6 (0.9737 ± 0.1317g/cm2) for RT were not different when inter and intracompared. Similarly, there were no differences in femoral neck BMD at T0 (0.7784 ± 0.1523g/cm2) and T6 (0.7905±0.1610g/cm2) for SWM, or T0 (0.7546 ± 0.1360g/cm2) and T6 (0.7522 ± 0.1421g/cm2) for RT. The results of this study showed no difference in BMD between RT and SWM after six months of training. Additionally, neither RT nor SWN produced significant increases in BMD of older women.