Exercise lowers heart rate

In our lives, there are many patients with arrhythmia. Their heart rate beats too fast, so doctors will recommend them to do some anaerobic exercise to lower their heart rate. Exercises that can lower the heart rate are slow-paced, just like the elderly people doing Tai Chi that we usually see in activity centers. The movements are very slow, and it can also play a role in strengthening the body and bones. So what exercises can lower the heart rate?

Exercise to lower your heart rate:

1. Walking: Walking can enhance myocardial contractility and dilate peripheral blood vessels, which has the effect of enhancing cardiac function, lowering blood pressure and preventing coronary heart disease. For people who experience angina when exercising, it can improve their condition. Each walk can last from 20 minutes to 1 hour, 1 to 2 times a day, or walk 800 to 2000 meters a day. Those who are in good physical condition may increase their walking speed appropriately.

2. Jogging: Jogging or running in place can also improve heart function. As for the jogging distance and the time of running in place, they should be determined according to each person's specific situation and there is no need to force it.

3. Tai Chi: It has a good preventive and therapeutic effect on hypertension, heart disease, etc. Generally speaking, patients with better physical strength can practice old-style Tai Chi, while those with poorer physical strength can practice simplified Tai Chi. If you can't do the full set, you can do half of it. Those who are weak or have poor memory can only practice individual movements and practice them in sections, and they don't have to do them continuously.

Heart rate and life expectancy

Science has discovered that the slower an animal's heart rate, the longer its life span. It has also been discovered that heart rate is an effective indicator for predicting a man's life span. So if you want to live a long life, you must slow down your heart rate. Ways to slow down your heart rate include exercise, maintaining your weight, quitting smoking and drinking, etc.

Animals: The slower the heart rate, the longer the life span

Scientists have long discovered that small mammals such as mice and rabbits have very fast heart rates, up to hundreds of beats per minute, but their lifespan is only 1 to 3 years. In contrast, large mammals such as whales are very heavy and have a slow heart rate of only about 20 beats per minute, yet their lifespan can reach 30 to 40 years. Scientists further confirmed that this pattern can be found in all mammals. Interestingly, a hamster’s heart beats about 500 to 600 times per minute, which is 20 to 30 times that of a whale, yet its weight is only one-half millionth of that of a whale.

People have discovered that a tortoise called Galapagos can live up to 177 years. Its heart beats only 6 times per minute, and its heart beats about 560 million times in its lifetime. Surprisingly, all mammals (except humans) have basically the same number of heartbeats in their lifetime, about 3 billion times.

Although each animal is different in size, the ratio of heart weight to body weight is roughly the same, which is 0.5% to 0.6% of body weight. At present, the exact causes of these phenomena have not been fully elucidated, but people have proposed an explanation: heart rate is determined by the body's energy metabolism needs and obeys the laws of biophysics. When the body's energy is exhausted, life ends, and heart rate is an effective indicator of the body's energy metabolism.