Free Healing Through Exercise: Scientifically Proven Ways to Prevent and Overcome Illness and Lengthen Your Life by Jörg Blech

lot of injuries: 14 percent of the examined soccer players had osteoarthritis, as did 31 percent of weight lifters.

    But running is not among the sports with a high risk for getting injured. According to a study of 27 long-distance runners, the human body is capable of running 20 to 40 kilometers per week for 40 years without damage. Compared to 27 non-runners, these endurance athletes did not show any arthritic signs at the joints of hip, knee, and ankle. 10 A similar result was found among runners with an average age of 63 who were monitored for five years, again with no sign of increased cartilage loss. 11

    By contrast, inactive and obese people have a higher incidence of osteoarthritis, and there seems to be a direct correlation. More than 45 percent of patients with severely osteoarthritic knees carry around above-average weight. Obesity triggers the problem. At first a person becomes fat, then subsequently develops ailing knees. The same connection was found for the hip. Being overweight at age 40 significantly increases the risk for developing osteoarthritis of the hip.

    We set our course in middle age, around 40. People who stop exercising by this age in order to protect their bones may actually cause the opposite effect. Jogging helps to reduce weight, which then relieves the joints. 12 Arthritis patients who are extremely overweight should be a little cautious, however. Instead of running, they should start out with bicycling and walking.

BEING RESTLESS, FIGHTING RHEUMATISM

    While osteoarthritis is triggered by physical abrasion, so-called rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic inflammatory disease that at first usually affects one particular joint or a few of them. By the time patients see a doctor, about 50 percent of them are no longer able to use their wrists normally. Within the first two years of the disease, big joints usually become affected, and many patients experience severe symptoms. Pain, swelling, and stiffness make it extremely difficult for them to be physically active. This leads to predictable consequences; people with arthritis frequently lose muscle mass and are 30 to 70 percent weaker than healthy people. Their heart and lungs function worse, and their endurance is reduced by 50 percent.

    Physiotherapy under supervision was for a long time the only physical activity that doctors allowed people with rheumatism. These cautious exercises helped the mobility of arthritis sufferers but not their fitness. For this purpose, aerobic training would have been needed—but physicians were reluctant to prescribe it to their patients because they were afraid it might bring even more damage to inflamed joints. However, it is turning out that this fear was unfounded. Many studies have shown that aerobic as well as strength training soothes the pain from rheumatism without showing any “increased disease activity or additional destruction of the joints,” says the orthopedic specialist Stefan Gödde at the University Hospital of Saarland in Hamburg. 13 Most of the trials included patients with mild to severe symptoms.

    Dutch researchers followed 300 patients with arthritis over the course of two years. One group of the participants received the standard treatment, whereas another group was prescribed exercise for two days per week: 20 minutes’ training on a stationary bike; 20 minutes’ strength training; and 20 minutes of games like soccer, badminton, basketball, and volleyball. The patients were reexamined every six months. Not only had their rheumatism not worsened, inflammatory processes in the joints were apparently soothed. Loss of bone density had slowed down, and overall fitness had improved, which in turn made the patients happier and more satisfied with their mental well-being.

FITNESS FOR FIBROMYALGIA

    Fibromyalgia is still a medical mystery. Although some physicians doubt its very existence and think of it as a psychiatric problem, others regard it as a widespread disease that is