An investigation of the effect of aerobic exercise on some physical parameters, quality of life and sleep in elderly adults living in nursing home

The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of regular aerobic exercise training to quality of sleep and life, reaction time, physical activity level of male sedentary elderly adults living in nursing home. Twenty-seven male sedentary elderly subjects (aged 65-85) participated in the study, of which 12 and 15 of them were in control and exercise group, respectively. Short Form-36 (SF-36) was used to assess quality of life and Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI) was used to assess quality of sleep. Six-minutes walking test (6MWT) was used to evaluate heart rate, blood pressure and oxygen saturation rate in order to assess physical activity level. For assessing reaction time, 6 different tests were used. These tests were simple visual fixed interval test (SV-FI), simple visual random interval (SV-RI), choice visual fixed interval (CV-FI), choice visual random interval (CV-RI), simple auditory fixed interval (SA-FI), simple auditory random interval (SA-RI). Aerobic exercise program was planned 3 days per week for 3 months. Aerobic exercise program comprise of 5-10 minute warm-up, 30 minute walk and 5 minute cool-down. Tests and measures are repeated at the beginning and end of the study. The data were statistically analysed, and the level of significance was considered p< 0.05. After the 12-week aerobic exercise program, statistically no differences were found in the control group (p>0,05). The exercise group incresed their scores in the physical functioning, role physical, bodily pain, and general health, components of SF-36 test (p<0,05). But in vitality, social functioning, role emotional, and mental health componnets of SF-36 test presented no significant differences (p>0,05). However, in PSQI, 6-minute walk distance and systolic blood pressure values significant differences were observed (p<0,05). The exercise group improved their rection times in SV-FI, CV-FI, CV-RI, SA-RI tests. Results of this study show that 12-week aerobic exercise program significantly improves the quality of sleep, quality of life, reaction time and physical activity level of elderly sedentary males living in nursing home. Keywords: Elderly Adults, quality of life, quality of sleep, six-minutes walking test, reaction time test