Here’s how to reap the benefits of exercise without breaking a sweat, reveals Dr. MICHAEL MOSLEY

We all know that regular exercise is good for us, but some people struggle with mobility while others just struggle to find the motivation.

Especially with the former in mind, scientists have been looking at ways that provide the benefits of exercise – without actually doing it.

THINK YOURSELF STRONGER

To get stronger, you normally expect some form of resistance exercise, such as pushups or weightlifting. But there are indications that you can also “think” yourself stronger. This relies on motor imagery – which you can get better at doing something by imagining yourself doing it. It is often used by top athletes to improve their performance, such as before the big race.

But it can also help mere mortals. A few years ago I took part in a study at the University of Northampton where a group of non-athletes was given a ‘training schedule’. For 15 minutes a day, five days a week, they had to imagine contracting their calf muscles as hard as they could, but without doing so.

They did this for four weeks: Despite not doing any extra exercise, their calf muscles were on average 8 percent stronger, and one man had increased his strength by 34 percent!

Their muscles had not increased in size: they now used much more muscle fibers in their calves.

I’m not suggesting that mental imagery can replace exercise, but it could be an effective way to reduce muscle loss when one is put on edge by injury or illness. In a 2014 study at Ohio University, 29 volunteers were asked to wear a plaster cast that immobilized their hand and wrist: Half of the group imagined moving their wrist for a few minutes a day.

After four weeks, all volunteers had lost some strength in their immobilized limb, but the people who had done mental imagery exercises were only 25 percent weaker, compared with 45 percent in the other group.

BOB UP AND DOWN

Japanese researchers have developed a chair that moves you up and down twice per second, mimicking the movements of jogging. A new study has shown that the chair led to improvements in blood pressure in volunteers.

The researchers, from the National Rehabilitation Center for Persons with Disabilities in Tokorozawa, believe the up-and-down motion causes fluid to slosh around the brain and that appears to affect molecules that help control blood pressure. So when you’re sitting at your computer or watching TV, try moving up and down a bit.

THE BANK POTATO PILL

It may sound like the stuff of a futuristic fantasy, but a pill that mimics many of the benefits of exercise could soon become a reality.

Scientists at Stanford University in the US have found that injecting mice with a protein called clusterin – which is released by our muscles when we exercise – boosted memory and mental acuity in the same way as a workout, according to results published in Nature.

Another US team is investigating whether jabbing with irisin – another hormone released by muscles during exercise – can convert white fat (which makes up most of the fat in our body) into healthier brown fat (which it burns). And finally, experts at Southampton University have identified a man-made chemical, compound 14, that “tricks” muscle cells into thinking the body is exercising, burning off excess blood sugar levels and potentially treating type 2 diabetes.

MUSCLE ZAPPING CHAIR

When you run or lift weights, your muscles move because the nerves that supply these muscles have told them to vibrate. But you can bypass the nerves using electrical muscle stimulation (EMS). This is an established treatment for multiple sclerosis or after a stroke and helps strengthen muscles by causing them to contract repeatedly.

There is some evidence that EMS can improve performance in elite athletes, but where it really scores is in improving pelvic floor muscles. There is now a chair called Emsella that sends out electronic pulses designed to make your pelvic floor muscles contract hundreds of times per minute. You sit on it, fully clothed, for 30 minutes at a time (it takes about six sessions to make a difference).

So how well does it work? In a three-week study published in the journal Energy Based Therapeutics and Diagnostics in 2019, 80 percent of middle-aged women with urinary incontinence who underwent the treatment reported significant improvement in their symptoms.

ACTIVITIES AS EXERCISE

Most of us don’t think of household chores like vacuuming as exercise. But maybe we should: A study conducted by a friend of mine, Ellen Langer, a professor of psychology at Harvard University, found that if you think of housework as a workout, the physical effect it has on the body improves. In a study published in Psychological Science, she interviewed 84 hotel maids about their work: none of them considered themselves fit or active, even though what they did was meeting the recommended daily amount of exercise. She revealed this to half of the group, leaving the rest in the dark.

A month later, repeated tests showed that the maids who had been told their jobs made them fit had lost 2 pounds each and, according to measures such as blood pressure, were “significantly healthier.”

One explanation is that when you think you are exercising, your body reacts as if it were.

THE ‘WALL SIT’ CHEAT

EARLIER this week, a study in the British Journal of Sports Medicine revealed that staying still—well, wall sit (squats against a wall) or doing planks—lowers blood pressure even more than aerobic exercise like running.

This may be due to blood flow after the muscles are released. If you can’t do either, you can try tensing and relaxing your calf muscles, much like the exercises you do on a long-haul flight.

I’d rather look old than get mentally confused

A disadvantage of getting older is that I have trouble with my hearing. In pubs or noisy restaurants, I can nod to myself or shout “what, WHAT?” And at home I use the subtitles on the TV to make sure I can follow the plot.

I’ve had my hearing tested and it’s fine, but I suspect I’ll be investing in hearing aids soon. Which should improve my hearing, but might also be good for my brain.

It is estimated that as many as 6.7 million people in the UK could benefit from a hearing aid, but only two million actually own one. That’s partly because of the stigma of “looking old and frail” and because many people don’t realize how bad their hearing is.

We’ve known for some time that poor hearing puts older people at a much higher risk of dementia. In an important 2011 study, American researchers found that mild hearing loss doubled the risk of dementia; severe hearing loss made it five times more likely.

But until recently, no one had assessed whether a hearing aid made a difference. Now researchers at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in the US have done just that: and they found that when older people (70+) got hearing aids, their risk of developing dementia was cut in half.

One of the reasons hearing is so important to brain health is that – as you become deaf – your inner ear starts sending garbled signals to your brain, causing mental confusion.

I’m more concerned about that than “looking old,” so I’m happy to wear hearing aids when I need to.

Trolley to test heart health

Browsing around a supermarket doesn’t sound like a health activity, but researchers at Liverpool John Moores University have done an ingenious experiment to show that it could be.

They fitted the handles of ten supermarket trolleys with electrocardiogram (ECG) sensors, devices that can pick up an irregular heartbeat. Customers were asked to hold the steering wheel for at least 60 seconds while shopping: if it lit red, they were seen by a pharmacist and, if necessary, forwarded to a cardiologist.

Over three months, the trolleys picked up 39 new cases of atrial fibrillation (AF), a condition that causes an irregular and often abnormally rapid heartbeat. AF increases the risk of stroke fivefold, but tragically, most people don’t know they are having a stroke until recently.