Purpose: Researches revealed that obese people have lower autonomic activation, especially the parasympathetic activation when compared to normal group; researches also suggested that exercise can improve the activation of autonomic nerve system. Heart rate variability (HRV) is noninvasive quantitative method for assessing the autonomic nervous activity. Therefore, this study was designed to investigate the effect of 10 week exercise training program on heart rate variability in obese adolescents. Methods: Twenty one obese adolescents (age: 13.21±0.39 yr, height: 161.15±6.74 cm, weight: 80.05±15.75 kg, and BMI>27) without regular exercise habit, and without any of the hypertension, diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases involved in a 10 week run/walk exercise program, three times per week, 30 minutes each session. Exercise loading was controlled in the heart rate range between 138 and 148 per minutes. Then the heart rate variability was compared before and after exercise training program. Results: The exercise training program in the study resulted in a significant decrease in the resting heart rate, and a significant increase in most of the time domain and frequency domain. Conclusions: Ten week of run/walk training program has significantly improved the parasympathetic nervous activation of the obese adolescents. This result also suggested that the autonomic nervous system (ANS) of the obese adolescents can be improved by exercise training program. The autonomic nervous system plays an important role in metabolism; this is a positive encouragement for the obese adolescents to involve in any of exercise program.
Purpose: Researches revealed that obese people have lower autonomic activation, especially the parasympathetic activation when compared to normal group; researches also suggested that exercise can improve the activation of autonomic nerve system. Heart rate variability (HRV) is noninvasive quantitative method for assessing the autonomic nervous activity. Therefore, this study was designed to investigate the effect of 10 week exercise training program on heart rate variability in obese adolescents. Methods: Twenty one obese adolescents (age: 13.21±0.39 yr, height: 161.15±6.74 cm, weight: 80.05±15.75 kg, and BMI>27) without regular exercise habit, and without any of the hypertension, diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases involved in a 10 week run/walk exercise program, three times per week, 30 minutes each session. Exercise loading was controlled in the heart rate range between 138 and 148 per minutes. Then the heart rate variability was compared before and after exercise training program. Results: The exercise training program in the study resulted in a significant decrease in the resting heart rate, and a significant increase in most of the time domain and frequency domain. Conclusions: Ten week of run/walk training program has significantly improved the parasympathetic nervous activation of the obese adolescents. This result also suggested that the autonomic nervous system (ANS) of the obese adolescents can be improved by exercise training program. The autonomic nervous system plays an important role in metabolism; this is a positive encouragement for the obese adolescents to involve in any of exercise program.