For many people busy with work and other responsibilities, their moderate-to-vigorous exercise often happens in one or two days a week or over the weekend. A study conducted by researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital, which is part of the Mass General Brigham healthcare system, reveals that this “weekend warrior” exercise approach is linked to a reduced risk of developing 264 different future diseases. This method of exercise proves to be as effective in lowering disease risk as exercising regularly throughout the week. The findings have been shared in Circulation.
“We know that physical activity plays a vital role in reducing the risk of many diseases,” stated co-senior author Shaan Khurshid, MD, MPH, who is part of the Demoulas Center for Cardiac Arrhythmias at Massachusetts General Hospital. “Our study underscores the potential advantages of the weekend warrior approach, which can reduce the risk not just for cardiovascular diseases, as we’ve previously demonstrated, but also across various conditions ranging from chronic kidney disease to mood disorders and more.”
Current recommendations advise engaging in at least 150 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity weekly for optimal health. However, among those who meet this guideline, do individuals who work out for 20-30 minutes most days of the week gain additional benefits compared to those who exercise for longer periods only 5 or 6 days apart?
Khurshid, along with co-senior author Patrick Ellinor, MD, PhD, acting chief of Cardiology and co-director of the Corrigan Minehan Heart Center at Massachusetts General Hospital, and their research team analyzed data from 89,573 participants in the UK Biobank study. These participants wore wrist accelerometers that tracked their overall physical activity and varying levels of exercise intensity over a one-week period. They grouped participants based on their activity patterns: weekend warriors, regular exercisers, or inactive individuals, using the guideline of 150 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity weekly.
The team then explored the connections between these activity patterns and the occurrence of 678 conditions across 16 disease categories, which included mental health issues, digestive disorders, neurological conditions, and more.
The analysis showed that both weekend warrior and regular exercise patterns were linked to a significantly decreased risk of over 200 diseases when compared to inactivity. The strongest associations were found for cardiometabolic conditions, such as hypertension (with a decrease in risk of 23% and 28% over a median follow-up of 6 years for weekend warriors and regular exercisers, respectively) and diabetes (with a 43% and 46% lower risk, respectively). Notably, these associations were found in all disease categories examined.
“Our results were consistent across various definitions of weekend warrior activity and different benchmarks for categorizing individuals as active,” Khurshid noted.
These findings suggest that physical activity can significantly lower the risk of future diseases, particularly cardiometabolic conditions. “Since weekend warrior activity and regular exercise yield similar benefits, it might be the total amount of physical activity that is most important rather than the frequency of workouts,” Khurshid explained. “It’s crucial for future studies to evaluate the effectiveness of concentrated activity for improving public health, and patients should be motivated to follow physical activity guidelines in whatever manner suits them best.”
