Our busy schedules make it challenging to integrate regular exercise sessions into our daily lives. Fortunately, short and intense bursts of exercise can produce an astonishing range of health benefits, too! A new study sheds light on how high-intensity interval training (HIIT) can improve and maintain good health, even in 20-minute sessions.
High-intensity interval training (HIIT) is where short, vigorous bursts of exercise are combined with recovery periods. This type of training is becoming more and more popular due to its fat-burning abilities, but lately, researchers have unveiled how it can offer much more. This has included studies revealing how it can boost memory and fight dementia and others that demonstrate strikingly beneficial effects on gut bacteria composition and wellness.
This new study, published on March 24 in the Journal of Physiology, focuses on low-volume HIIT, where the total session time (including warm-up and cool down) lasts no longer than around 20 minutes – with less than 15 minutes of actual high-intensity exercise. The collaborating authors in Australia and Canada reviewed ten years’ worth of existing literature on the subject, yielding exciting discoveries.
The World Health Organization currently recommends between 150 to 300 minutes of moderate exercise or 75 to 100 minutes of intense activity per week for adults. Despite taking far less time and energy, the authors found that low-volume HIIT exercise delivers comparable, or sometimes superior, improved arterial health, heart function, and metabolic health.
While the researchers still don’t fully understand the physiological reasons behind this, they suggest that the metabolic improvements are caused by enhanced mitochondrial function and insulin sensitivity. In contrast, some cardiovascular enhancements appear to be linked with increased left ventricular function and enhanced central and peripheral arterial compliance.
These findings provide useful information for people who don’t have enough time to exercise and people with health issues or a compromised capacity for physical activity. This was verified through a previous study published by the same authors, where four-minute HIIT sessions, three times a week, resulted in improved liver fat, blood sugar levels, and cardiorespiratory fitness in type 2 diabetics.
Dr. Angelo Sabag, the study author, said:
While the WHO guidelines may serve their purpose at a populational level, individualized and tailored low-volume HIIT interventions delivered by appropriately trained exercise professionals may be more effective at an individual level, especially for time-poor individuals.
This research is especially important now as people are looking for new and exciting ways to engage in regular exercise, after a year of lower physical activity due to the pandemic.
Last year, a clinical trial evaluated the efficiency of a good diet and exercise as a type 2 diabetes treatment. It found that after only 12 months, nearly two-thirds of patients achieved complete disease remission.
For those people who can’t exercise due to physical limitations, scientists are working on making a pill that delivers the same neuroprotective effects of exercise without having to exercise. Losing weight isn’t an easy task without exercising; however, there are various phycological tips to achieve weight loss.
