It goes without saying that exercise has many benefits. Sure, it's tiring, but exercise is one way that you can do to help maintain overall body health. Jogging, yoga, gymnastics, or just doing stretching are included in the types of light exercise that you can do every day, including push-up. Even though it sounds tiring because push-up requires more muscle strength, the maximum number of push up that you can do can reflect your heart health, especially in men.

Based on research conducted by Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, men who can do push-up more than 40 times at a time have a 96% lower risk of developing heart-related illnesses in the next 10 years compared to men who can only do push-ups less than 10 times. The researchers explained that this discovery could be used as a method to help determine the condition of heart health. Furthermore, they explained that this result was considered stronger than the results of the treadmill test.

In their study, the researchers involved 1,104 firefighters with an average age of 39 years. The health of the participants was reviewed for 10 years starting from 2000 to 2010. At the start of the study, participants were asked to undergo an ability test to do push-up movements and treadmill tests.

According to the study, which was published in JAMA Network journal, after those 10 years, the researchers found 37 cases related to the heart. These cases mostly occurred in those who cannot do push-ups more than 10 times. Only 1 of the 37 cases occurred in those who can do push-ups more than 40 times at a time.

Text by Anggie Triana
Stock photos from Pixabay

Source(s):

• Yang, J., Christopi, C. A., Farioli, A., et al (2019). Association between Exercise Capacity Push-ups and Future Cardiovascular Events Among Active Adult Men. JAMA Network, DOI: 10.1001 / jamamanopen.2018.8341.
• Medical News Today - Pushups ability may be predict cardiovascular risk (2019). https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/324486.php, March 4, 2019.