Exercise appears to be capable of exerting a positive effect on bone mass, but how exercise can be used to best advantage in the prevention and therapy of osteopenia is unclear. Weight-bearing activity has been commonly considered to be essential for the beneficial effects of exercise on the skeleton, and, therefore, swimming has been considered valueless in the maintenance of bone mass. To examine the issue, we measured femoral neck and lumbar spine bone mineral density (BMD) in sixteen male college competitive swimmers. Their age (M±S. D.), height and weight were 20.5±1.1 yrs, 174.2±5.8cm, 72.3±9.7kg respectively. At vertebral sites (1.148±0.095g/cm^2), the male swimmers had significantly greater BMD than the nonexercisers (1.00±0.77 Z-Score, p<.001). At femoral neck sites (1.091±0.111g/cm^2), the male swimmers had significantly greater BMD than the nonexercisers (2.69±1.08 Z-Score, p<.001). These results suggest that swimming exercise may be beneficial in the prevention or therapy of osteoporosis and that its potential usefulness in this regard is greater for femoral neck sites than for lumbar spine sites.
Exercise appears to be capable of exerting a positive effect on bone mass, but how exercise can be used to best advantage in the prevention and therapy of osteopenia is unclear. Weight-bearing activity has been commonly considered to be essential for the beneficial effects of exercise on the skeleton, and, therefore, swimming has been considered valueless in the maintenance of bone mass. To examine the issue, we measured femoral neck and lumbar spine bone mineral density (BMD) in sixteen male college competitive swimmers. Their age (M±S. D.), height and weight were 20.5±1.1 yrs, 174.2±5.8cm, 72.3±9.7kg respectively. At vertebral sites (1.148±0.095g/cm^2), the male swimmers had significantly greater BMD than the nonexercisers (1.00±0.77 Z-Score, p<.001). At femoral neck sites (1.091±0.111g/cm^2), the male swimmers had significantly greater BMD than the nonexercisers (2.69±1.08 Z-Score, p<.001). These results suggest that swimming exercise may be beneficial in the prevention or therapy of osteoporosis and that its potential usefulness in this regard is greater for femoral neck sites than for lumbar spine sites.