published in The Lancet Public Health<\/a>, even a modest step count of 4,000 steps per day was linked to better health outcomes compared with 2,000 steps.<\/p>\n“For those who are not very active or doing nothing, doing something is still good for you,” Professor Ding said.<\/p>\n
Daily steps linked to better health outcomes<\/p>\n
Unlike previous research on daily step counts, which has largely focused on the connection to heart health and overall mortality risk, the researchers analysed evidence for a wide range of health outcomes.<\/p>\n
This included cardiovascular disease, cancer, type 2 diabetes, cognitive decline and mental health.<\/p>\n
Researchers examined data from more than 160,000 adults across 57 studies, in which participants wore step-counting devices such as fitness trackers.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
The researchers say 7,000 steps may be a more achievable benchmark for people. (Getty Images: wundervisuals)<\/p>\n
“We know that physical activity is associated with a broad range of health benefits, and steps is just one way of capturing physical activity,” Professor Ding said.<\/p>\n
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The researchers found health benefits increased with every 1000-step increment, compared with low levels of activity.<\/p>\n
But after 7,000 steps, these benefits tended to level off: the risk of all-cause mortality, for example, was almost the same at 7,000 daily steps as it was at 10,000.<\/p>\n
For dementia, walking 10,000 steps a day produced an extra 7 per cent reduction in risk (compared with 7,000 steps).<\/p>\n
The benefits of additional steps were slightly more pronounced for type 2 diabetes. Taking 10,000 steps produced an extra 8 per cent risk reduction, and 12,000 steps added an extra 5 per cent reduction on top of that.<\/p>\n
Findings to inform national guidelines<\/p>\n
University of Melbourne Centre for Health, Exercise and Sports Medicine director Kim Bennell said the study was “important”.<\/p>\n
“We often get told 10,000 steps a day is what we [should] aim for, but that’s not strictly evidence-based,” Professor Bennell said.<\/p>\n
“The general message is you don’t need to be necessarily doing 10,000 steps to get benefits.<\/p>\n
“Lower numbers can still be beneficial \u2026 and people are more likely to stick to it if they feel they can achieve it.”<\/p>\n
The research team is working with the federal government to use the findings to inform Australia’s national physical activity guidelines. But they also noted some limitations of the study.<\/p>\n
Your guide to exercising without trying<\/a><\/p>\nDoing the vacuuming or taking the dog for a walk? Pick up the pace \u2014 these bursts of incidental exercise could be key to improving your fitness.<\/p>\n
While there was a wealth of data for the team to analyse some health outcomes, including cardiovascular disease, there were only a few studies available for other health indicators, including falls and cancer.<\/p>\n
The research team suggested the findings associated with these should be treated as “exploratory” instead of conclusive.<\/p>\n
Professor Ding also noted that they were not able to investigate how the impact of daily step counts differed for different groups of people, such as those with a higher body mass index (BMI) or older individuals.<\/p>\n
She suggested that older people might need even fewer than 7,000 steps to get significant benefits, but more research was needed to confirm this.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If you find getting your daily step-count up to 10,000 a challenge, Australian researchers have some good news:…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20661,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[20599,21325,64,63,1617,9757,4830,137,1296,21327,21328,21326,21324],"class_list":["post-20660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-10000-steps","tag-7000-steps-a-day-lowers-health-risk","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cancer","tag-dementia","tag-depression","tag-health","tag-heart-disease","tag-how-many-steps-do-i-need-to-do-daily","tag-how-many-steps-do-i-need-to-do","tag-how-many-steps-do-i-need-to-walk-each-day","tag-step-count"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20660\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20661"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}