Why is bone health important?
Bones play many roles in the body — providing structure, protecting organs, anchoring muscles and storing calcium? While it’s important to build strong and healthy bones during childhood and adolescence, you can take steps during adulthood to protect bone health, too.
Did you know?
Your bones are continuously changing — new bone is made and old bone is broken down. When you’re young, your body makes new bone faster than it breaks down old bone, and your bone mass increases. Most people reach their peak bone mass around age 30. (The higher your peak bone mass, the more bone you have “in the bank” and the less likely you are to develop osteoporosis as you age.) After that, bone re-modelling continues, but you lose slightly more bone mass than you gain.
WHAT CAN YOU DO AS AN ADULT to keep your bones strong and in the best condition as possible?
- Moderate to high impact weight-bearing and resistance exercises are the best type of exercise for improving bone density, building strong bones and preventing osteoporosis ( health condition that weakens bones, making them fragile and more likely to break.)
- Avoiding inactivity is extremely important, especially today where sedentary lifestyles are increasingly becoming the norm. Not only does exercise build muscle and strengthen bone, it also improves balance, which helps to prevent falls.
Adults should do at least 150 minutes (2 1/2 hours) a week (e.g. 30 mins a day, 5 days a week) of moderate-intensity aerobic activity.
- Nourishing your bones and body by correct food is absolutely necessary .
Impact: Bones need to be subjected to compressive forces (the weight of the body acts as a compressive force during exercise) to stimulate them to increase or maintain density.
Weight: Weight-bearing exercise – which is any exercise where muscle overcomes a resistant force, including gravity – staves off age-related declining muscle mass and grows new muscle.
Resistance: Resistance training is a weight-bearing exercise that involves using weights or resistance bands to create a strong resistance for muscles to overcome.
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Best Exercises for Bone Health
1.Walking
Walking is an all-round excellent exercise that most people can manage, no matter their fitness levels. Walking is a weight-bearing exercise but is low impact, so does not put a lot of stress on joints.
Some people don’t necessarily think of walking as a proper form of exercise, and rather see it more as a way of getting from A to B, but just 30 minutes a day of BRISK walking is enough to see real health benefits. The recommendation is about 10,000 steps a day – a pedometer will help you keep on target.
You can add to the intensity of the exercise by carrying hand weights or wearing ankle weights or rucksack .
2.Stair climbing/Step ups
Stair climbing is a step up from walking in terms of challenge but is still a low to moderate impact exercise (depending on speed of activity). It also engages more muscles than walking or jogging. You can use an ordinary staircase or a special exercise step that has removable blocks so you can adjust the height.
When performing a step up, make sure your entire foot is on the step and your knee is directly above your ankle.
3.Dancing
Dancing is a wonderful way to keep fit, offering a social dimension to exercise along with the health benefits. There are a wide variety of dance classes available, with some dance classes offering both high impact and low impact versions like Zumba, Dance fit, Aerobics, Boxercise or our Functional fitness class.
Dancing is great for balance, coordination, cardiovascular fitness and – as a weight-bearing exercise – is good for toning muscles and encouraging strong bones. It is also good for the brain as learning steps and routines is mentally, as well as physically, demanding.
4.Free weights
Weight training is a popular type of strength training that involves lifting weights in repetitions. Weight training challenges your muscles and in doing so creates trauma, causing microscopic tears in the muscle fibres. When the muscle repairs itself, it grows bigger and stronger. Therefore, it is essential to have rest days and not overdo it, otherwise the muscles will not have chance to repair and grow.
As well as the weight from muscle helping to encourage new formation of bone, muscle also protects bones against injury.
5.Resistance bands
Resistance bands are a versatile and highly portable exercise tool designed to strengthen muscles through resistance. They are rubber bands of various lengths and thicknesses that are pushed or pulled against depending on the exercise being performed. As with weight training, they are effective for building and toning muscle and are suitable for all levels of ability.
6.Running/jogging
Running and jogging are excellent for bone health, being high-impact activities, and excellent for cardiovascular fitness and muscular strength.
Jogging is usually defined as running at a speed of under 6mph. Both running and jogging are forms of aerobic exercise, but running is more demanding on the heart, lungs and muscles.
It is essential to wear a good pair of trainers when running or jogging and to warm up beforehand to prevent pulled muscles. People who enjoy this form of exercise should also be mindful of the force exerted on joints, especially knees, as it can be very wearing if proper technique isn’t observed.
Done properly, running and jogging can be cathartic, immune-boosting and lead to all-round fitness.
- Yoga/Balance
Fantastic for improving flexibility, balance and strength and as weight-bearing exercise ,good for bone health. Very low impact, involve holding challenging poses in order to build strength throughout the body.
Teaming any of these disciplines in a regular regime would be a winning formula for all-round health.
Bone health nutrients
1.Protein
Consuming enough protein not optional, In fact, about 50% of bone is made of protein. And proteins are not only important for your bones but also for
your cells, muscles, hormones and much much more.
- Eat lots of vegetables and eat high-calcium foods throughout the day
Calcium is the main mineral found in bones and must be consumed every day to protect bone health. Spreading calcium intake throughout the day will optimise absorption.
- Make sure you have enough of Vitamin D with Vitamin K in your body. (AUTUMN IS TIME OF THE YEAR TO START TAKING VIT. D3)
Vitamin D plays several roles in bone health, including helping your body absorb calcium. You may be able to get enough vitamin D through sun exposure (about 75%you get only from sun) and rest through the food sources such as fatty fish, egg yolk, mushrooms, milk…However, many people need to supplement with up to 2,000 IU of vitamin D daily in winter to maintain optimal levels and if deficient, even more. (Ask your GP or have a test done on D3 deficiency if you are not sure)
Vitamin K helps absorb vit. D3 and supports bone health by modifying osteocalcin, a protein involved in bone formation. This modification enables osteocalcin to bind to minerals in bones and helps prevent the loss of calcium from bones.
- Consider taking more collagen
Collagen is the main protein found in bones. It contains the amino acids glycine, proline and lysine, which help build bone, muscle, ligaments and other tissues. As you age, your body is producing less and less collagen. Great source is bone broth but it must be made from high quality bones and boiling for 6+hours. Or choose good quality supplements.
- Consume Foods High in Omega-3 Fats
Omega-3 fatty acids are well known for their anti-inflammatory effects. They’ve also been shown to help protect against bone loss during the ageing process. In addition to including omega-3 fats in your diet, it’s also important to make sure your balance of omega-6 to omega-3 fats isn’t too high. Great source and great ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 has camp seeds and hemp seed oil.
Have questions or comments? Contact Ivana for more information!