Exercise Referral Instructors’ Perspectives on Supporting and Motivating Participants to Uptake, Attend and Adhere to Exercise Prescription: A Qualitative Study

Abstract

Exercise referral schemes are designed to support people with non-communicable diseases to increase their levels of exercise to improve health. However, uptake and attendance are low. This exploratory qualitative study aims to understand uptake and attendance from the perspectives of exercise referral instructors using semi-structured interviews. Six exercise referral instructors from one exercise referral scheme across four exercise referral sites were interviewed. Four themes emerged: (i) the role that instructors perceive they have and approaches instructors take to motivate participants to take-up, attend exercise referral and adhere to their exercise prescription; (ii) instructors’ use of different techniques, which could help elicit behaviour change; (iii) instructors’ perceptions of participants’ views of exercise referral schemes; and (iv) barriers towards providing an exercise referral scheme. Exercise referral instructors play an important, multifaceted role in the uptake, attendance and adherence to exercise referral. On-going education and peer support for instructors may be useful. Instructors’ perspectives help us to further understand how health and leisure services can design successful exercise referral schemes.

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A Narrative Review of Non-Pharmacological Strategies for Managing Sarcopenia in Older Adults with Cardiovascular and Metabolic Diseases

“…One way this could be achieved is by modifying behaviour, a topic that has generated increasing attention in recent literature, particularly in relation to individuals with sarcopenia and/or CVD/MDs. Evidence of behavioural change has emerged from recent randomised controlled trials (e.g., [248,249]), systematic reviews (e.g., [250,251]), meta-analyses (e.g., [248,249,252,253]) and studies established to inform programme design and improvement (e.g., [254][255][256]). It is imperative that practitioners understand the underlying principles and mechanisms underpinning intervention design for this population to bring about meaningful changes.…”