Physical activity for aging: a lifelong learning approach

Background. Elderly’s quality of life is negatively affected by senescence. Cognitive abilities are mild and gradually impaired, and motor units becomes bigger and slower. Initially, degeneration process does not significantly affect quality of life, but inactivity can accelerate it. Physical activity (PA) is a needful tool to counteract the effect of aging furthermore, the intervention success is related to the modality of exercise proposition (Bangsbo et al., 2019; Bull et al., 2020). Our aim is to suggest 1) a lifelong learning-based approach for strength and balance exercise, and 2) fatigue and intensity self-evaluation on walking activity. Research methods. 20 Elderly (65–80 YO) will be asked to participate in PA interventions that will be integrated by the aid of a smartphone application (APP) (Helbostad et al., 2017). They receive suggestion and test: 1) outdoor, during walking to assess the intensity (Talk Test) or the fatigue (OMNI); 2) at home, to self-adapt body posture during strength or balance exercises that are proposed in three incremental difficulty levels, moving from segmental to global execution. PACES-8-it will be used to evaluate enjoyment of the PA before, during and at the end of the study. Results and discussion. The propose of an APP for PA is a strong implementation to optimize the efficiency and the intensity of exercise. 1) To improve the PA efficiency, data provides instant suggestion to modify the intensity or can elaborate an answer for next walks: the older people that are involved in long-distance walking can receive different test, the first of them is to talk with the APP, more is breathless more is intense. Moreover, through the OMNI scale the subject evaluates the fatigue during and after the walk. 2) Exercises focus on segmental district of the body, lead the elderly to re-build global movement useful for daily life activities. Through self-correction they may improve cognitive abilities related to more efficient and safer execution. Enjoyment assessment is useful to evaluate the activity proposed, more the people enjoy more the people practice PA, in a virtuous cycle for lifelong learning (Boulton-Lewis, 2010; Narushima, Liu, & Diestelkamp, 2018). Conclusions. This innovative and robust methodology will be proposed in a case series study, it will permit to evaluate the quantity and the quality of physical activity offered with a lifelong learning approach. References Bangsbo, J., Blackwell, J., Boraxbekk, C. J., Caserotti, P., Dela, F., Evans, A. B., … Viña, J. (2019). Copenhagen Consensus statement 2019: Physical activity and ageing. British Journal of Sports Medicine, 53(14), 856–858. https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2018100451 Boulton-Lewis, G. M. (2010). Education and learning for the elderly: Why, how, what. Educational Gerontology, 36(3), 213–228. https://doi.org/10.1080/03601270903182877 Bull, F., Saad Al-Ansari, S., Biddle, S., Borodulin, K., Buman, M., Cardon, G., … Willumsen, J. (2020). World Health Organization 2020 guidelines on physical activity and sedentary behaviour. British Journal of Sports Medicine, 1451–1462. https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2020-102955 Helbostad, J. L., Vereijken, B., Becker, C., Todd, C., Taraldsen, K., Pijnappels, M., … Mellone, S. (2017). Mobile health applications to promote active and healthy ageing. Sensors (Basel, Switzerland), 17(3), 1–13. https://doi.org/10.3390/s17030622 Narushima, M., Liu, J., & Diestelkamp, N. (2018). Lifelong learning in active ageing discourse: Its conserving effect on wellbeing, health and vulnerability. Ageing and Society, 38(4), 651–675. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0144686X16001136