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There is a new fitness chart
appliance on the health industry geared for both men and women.
The novel device identifies how physically fit either gender
is and how it will affect their mortality rate. The tool is
non-complicated to use. It identifies how an individual’s personal
fitness level compares with other people of the same age group.
Medical professionals, as well as, fitness facilities are using
the health charting technology.
In order to use the new chart,
the end-user has to be cognizant of how much physical activity
they are capable of performing. Evaluating one’s fitness level
is a matter of reading the units (METs) that monitor activity
on stationary bicycles, treadmill and cross-trainers.
Over the years, fitness charts
have been available for evaluating men’s fitness abilities.
Before now, the female gender’s data was never collected. The
transition occurred during a rigorous testing of 6,000 Chicago-area
women. During a clinical trial part of the St. James Women Take
Heart Project, exercise stress tests were conducted by researcher
Martha Gulati, MD, of the. Rush University.
Normally, physicians use electrocardiograms
(EKGs) to determine heart conditions. Alternatively, the study
has found that exercise is equivocally important in the valuation
of one’s overall health According to Gulati, "Having a
good fitness level for one's age predicts better survival."
Generally, the test evaluates
one’s fitness level to ascertain the life expectancy of the
subject. Overall, women elevate their risk by 50 percent if
they are unable to exercise at 85 percent of their normal age
level. (More details of the Women Take Heart Project can be
found in the August 4, 2005 issue of The New England Journal
of Medicine.
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