Background
Smoking is strongly associated with arterial stiffness. Long-term regular aerobic exercise is an effective lifestyle intervention that improve arterial stiffness in healthy young people, however, the results of research on the immediate effect of short-term aerobic exercise on arterial stiffness in individuals with different smoking statuses have been inconsistent. The purpose of this study was to investigate the immediate effects of acute aerobic exercise on arterial stiffness in people with different smoking statuses.
Method:
People who participated in the sixth follow-up visit of the Kailuan Study (trial registration number: ChiCTR-TNRC-11001489) and participated in the fifth National Physical Fitness Monitoring were selected as subjects. All participants completed measurements of brachial–ankle pulse wave velocity, blood pressure, and heart rate before and after a two-stage load test on a power bicycle. The generalized linear model was established to analyze between-group differences in the change in brachial–ankle pulse wave velocity before and after aerobic exercise in people with different smoking statuses.
Results
There was a total of 940 male participants (36.82 ± 7.76 years old). On the basis of the smoking status, the subjects were divided into the following four groups: never smokers (n = 231), former smokers (n = 165), low-intensity smokers (n = 254), and high-intensity smokers (n = 290). After the two-stage load test, brachial–ankle pulse wave velocity was immediately decreased overall (1375.08 ± 209.09 vs. 1341.53 ± 208.04 cm/s, P < 0.05). The generalized linear model showed that after adjusting for confounding factors, the β-values and 95% confidence intervals of former smokers, low-intensity smokers, and high-intensity smokers were − 12.17 (− 30.08, 5.75), − 18.43 (− 34.69, − 2.16), and − 22.46 (− 38.39, − 6.54) cm/s compared with never smokers, respectively.
Conclusion
Our results suggest that a single short-term aerobic exercise can immediately improve arterial stiffness in people with different smoking statuses. and clinicians must prescribe individualized exercises for different groups of people to improve arterial stiffness, and reduce the damage to blood vessels caused by smoking.