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Exercise training reduces the acute physiological severity of post-menopausal hot flushes
Journal article   Open access   Peer reviewed

Exercise training reduces the acute physiological severity of post-menopausal hot flushes

Tom G Bailey, N Timothy Cable, Nabil Aziz, Greg Atkinson, Daniel J Cuthbertson, David A Low and Helen Jones
Journal of Physiology, Vol.594(3), pp.657-667
2016
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PDF - Author's Accepted Version1.05 MBDownloadView
Accepted VersionPDF - Author Accepted Version Open Access
url
https://doi.org/10.1113/JP271456View
Published Version

Abstract

post-menopause hot flushes exercise UniSC Diversity Area - Life Stages
A hot-flush is characterised by feelings of intense heat, profuse elevations in cutaneous vasodilation and sweating, and reduced brain blood flow. Exercise training reduces self-reported hot-flush severity, but underpinning physiological data are lacking. We hypothesised that exercise training attenuates the changes in cutaneous vasodilation, sweat rate and cerebral blood flow during a hot flush. In a preference trial, 18 symptomatic post-menopausal women underwent a passive heat stress to induce hot-flushes at baseline and follow-up. Fourteen participants opted for a 16-week moderate intensity supervised exercise intervention, while 7 participants opted for control. Sweat rate, cutaneous vasodilation, blood pressure, heart rate and middle cerebral artery velocity (MCAv) were measured during the hot-flushes. Data were binned into eight equal segments, each representing 12.5% of hot flush duration. Weekly self-reported frequency and severity of hot flushes were also recorded at baseline and follow-up. Following training, mean hot-flush sweat rate decreased by 0.04 mg.cm2.min-1 at the chest (95% CI: 0.02-0.06, P = 0.01) and by 0.03 mg.cm2.min-1 (0.02-0.05, P = 0.03) at the forearm, compared with negligible changes in control. Training also mediated reductions in cutaneous vasodilation by 9% (6-12) at the chest and by 7% (4-9) at forearm (P≤0.05). Training attenuated hot flush MCAv by 3.4 cm/s (0.7-5.1, P = 0.04) compared with negligible changes in control. Exercise training reduced the self-reported severity of hot-flush by 109 arbitrary units (80-121, P<0.001). These data indicate that exercise training leads to parallel reductions in hot-flush severity and within-flush changes in cutaneous vasodilation, sweating and cerebral blood flow.

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Neurosciences
Physiology

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#3 Good Health and Well-Being
#5 Gender Equality

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