The Study on the Health-Promotion Practice for Aged People using Aquabics

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We have made aged people's health-promotion practice using indoor swimming pool for 5 years. The aquabic class was held twice or thrice a month all year round, the number of the participants of one class member being about 25 to 40 and the exercise was made for 1 hour for 1 class. The mild aquabics exercises for the aged participants with 2 to 4 attendants of the investigators of this project were made by the professional instructor. About two hundreds of the aged have attended our practice within five years. Almost all of them stated their impression of the first experience for aquabics class as "very joyfull experience", "the therapeutic effect of backache", the decrease for the pain of the genu of internal capsule or the stiff shoulder" and "the increase of the good rhythm in daily life".On the other hand, the measurements were made thrice a year about "good walker's index" and once a year about the bone density, the "QOL index" and "Self-efficacy index". The good walker's index, which is regarded as the very useful index for the protection of falling down for the aged, significantly increased one year after the beginning of the practice. The bone density was not increased significantly but not decreased significantly even for ladies within these years. The QOL index and the self efficacy index were both kept in the same level as that in the beginning.In conclusion, the health promotion activity using aquabics is very useful for the aged people's maintenance of physical and mental health. We are continuing this study furthermore.