Chennai: Simple exercises can help improve the health of patients with chronic kidney diseases (CKD).
Many patients with CKD are less physically active and have reduced physical functioning and performance compared to the ones that don’t suffer from this, says Dr Suresh Shankar , nephrologist.
He adds: “However, strong research suggests that exercise interventions have the potential to boost several health parameters and outcomes in CKD patients. Constant fatigue and muscle weakness, people with Chronic Kidney disease (CKD) have low levels of physical activity. The decrease in physical volume in this patient cohort is notable as it is associated with deconditioning and muscle wasting, deteriorating kidney function, and an increased risk of comorbidities such as cardiovascular disease, thus reducing the quality of life, frequent hospitalizations, and mortality.”
Now that we know why exercise is important for CKD patients, let us also understand what the meaning of exercise is, he says and adds: Exercise is defined as a planned, structured, and repetitive bodily movement to boost or maintain the desired shape. An example of this might be a 30-minute walk that improves aerobic fitness over time. While we all know that an inactive lifestyle could even be a strong risk factor for poor heart health, and exercise is useful to pump up overall health and reduce cardiovascular risk. In the past, the understanding was that vigorous physical activity is additionally harmful to those individuals with CKD, but it’s likely partially because of these beliefs that these patients show a scarcity of participation in exercise activities.
However, CKD patients must follow an exercise program that’s designed to intensify the advantages and minimise the risks.