Increased physical activity, not weight loss, gives individuals with coronary heart disease a longer lease on life, according to a new study conducted at NTNU.

The study shows that it is much more important to exercise than to lose weight for patients with coronary heart disease conditions, such as angina pectoris and heart attacks.

NTNU researchers have found that heart disease patients can gain weight without jeopardizing their health, but sitting in their recliner incurs significant health risks.

Weight loss seems to be associated with increased mortality for the participants in the study who were normal weight at baseline. But the way these associations are calculated may be erroneous, as noted in a Gemini article that cites Professor Bård Eirik Kulseng on the myth of the obesity paradox.

The article, which is an observational study based on data from HUNT (the Nord-Trøndelag Health Study), was recently published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

Extended follow-up

Researcher Trine Moholdt in NTNU’s Department of Circulation and Medical Imaging collaborated on the study with cardiologist Carl J. Lavie at the John Ochsner Heart and Vascular Institute in New Orleans, and Javaid Nauman at NTNU.

They studied 3,307 individuals (1,038 women) with coronary heart disease from HUNT. These patients were examined in 1985, 1996, and 2007, and followed up to the end of 2014. The data from HUNT were compared with data from the Norwegian Cause of Death Registry.

During the 30-year period, 1,493 of the participants died and 55% of the deaths were due to cardiovascular disease.

“This study is important because we’ve been able to look at change over time, and not many studies have done that, so I am forever grateful to HUNT and the HUNT participants,” said Moholdt.