Exercise provides a wide range of health-promoting benefits, but support is limited for clinical programs that use exercise as a means of health promotion. This stands in contrast to restorative or rehabilitative exercise, which is considered an essential medical service. We propose that there is a place for ongoing, structured wellness and health promotion programs, with exercise as the primary therapeutic focus. Such programs have long-lasting health benefits, are easily implementable, and are associated with high levels of participant satisfaction. We describe the dissemination and implementation of a long-standing exercise and health promotion program, Gerofit, for which significant gains in physical function that have been maintained over 5 years of follow-up, improvements in well-being, and a 10-year 25% survival benefit among program adherents have been documented. The program has been replicated at 6 Veterans Affairs Medical Centers. The pooled characteristics of enrolled participants (n = 691) demonstrate substantial baseline functional impairment (usual gait speed 1.05 ± 0.3 m/s, 8-foot up and go 8.7 ± 6.7 seconds, 30-second chair stands 10.7 ± 5.1, 6-minute walk distance 404.31 ± 141.9 m), highlighting the need for such programs. Change scores over baseline for 3, 6, and 12 months of follow-up are clinically and statistically significant (P < .05 all measures) and replicate findings from the parent program. Patient satisfaction ratings of high ranged from 88% to 94%. We describe the implementation process and present 1-year outcomes. We suggest that such programs be considered essential elements of healthcare systems.
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 5. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 28 March 2018.
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#9,893,605
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Outputs from Journal of the American Geriatrics Society
#5,864
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#153,394
of 486,278 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Journal of the American Geriatrics Society
#78
of 102 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 32,761,728 research outputs across all sources so far. This one has received more attention than most of these and is in the 69th percentile.
So far Altmetric has tracked 9,991 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a lot more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 23.0. This one is in the 41st percentile – i.e., 41% of its peers scored the same or lower than it.
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We're also able to compare this research output to 102 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one is in the 23rd percentile – i.e., 23% of its contemporaries scored the same or lower than it.
