Heart Disease Related to Number of Push-Ups
The number of push-ups you can perform correlates well with your risk of heart disease. Heart disease remains the number one killer in the United States despite our attempts to address risk factors like hypertension, elevated cholesterol, diabetes, and smoking. Several studies have suggested that physical activity provided cardiovascular benefits independent of these other risk factors.
Push-up exercise capacity may be a simple way to assess one’s risk of heart disease. Typically we have relied on a patient’s self-report of exercise or activity level to assess one’s likely cardiorespiratory fitness level (CRF). However, when we actually test one’s level of CRF we often see lower levels of CRF than anticipated based on one’s self-report. Therefore, patient’s may be overstating how active they really are.
We can measure CRF during a graded exercise test but it is a bit time consuming and not practical for all practices. Push-ups can easily be measured in the office setting and may serve as good substitute for the exercise treadmill test and determining push-up exercise capacity does not add any cost like an exercise treadmill test.
Push-ups in Firefighters
A study on push-ups and its correlation to heart disease in firefighters was published in 2019. Just over 1100 firefighters with a mean age of 39.6 were involved in a study that determined it the number of push-ups they could complete correlated with their risk of future cardiovascular events. They were then followed for an average of ten years to see who suffered a cardiovascular event (CVD) (heart attack, sudden death, or heart failure).
Participants tried to complete as many push-ups as they could in one minute with a metronome set at 80 beats per minute. An inverse relationship was found between push-up capacity and CVD events. Those who completed 40 or more push-ups had significantly lower risk of having a CVD event than those who performed fewer than ten. The number of push-ups also correlated well to blood pressure, cholesterol and glucose levels with those parameters being lower in those who performed more push-ups.
Those who performed more than 40 push-ups had one-eight the risk of a CVD event compared to those men who performed 10 or less.
Thus, push-ups in the office seems like an easy tool to determine who might be at higher risk for cardiovascular disease.
Recommended Number of Push-Ups By Age
How many push-ups should you be able to do? That will certainly vary by age and gender. The various branches of the military have their own requirements. The following chart is from the Essentials of Exercise Physiology. We recommend you strive to be at least in the good category for you age and gender.
References:
Yang, Justin; et al. Association Between Push-up Exercise Capacity and Future Cardiovascular Events Among Active Adults Men, JAMA Open Network, February 15, 2019. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2724778
McArdle WD, Katch FI, Katch VL. Essentials of Exercise Physiology, 5th North American Edition. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. 2015.
