Do marathon runners have healthier hearts?
Differences in coronary vasodilatory capacity and atherosclerosis in endurance athletes using coronary CTA and computational fluid dynamics (CFD): Comparison with a sedentary lifestyle.
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a healthcare professional. Terms
Runners who train a lot have less dangerous types of heart plaque and their arteries open wider with a special medicine, but they still might have narrow arteries.
No biological mechanisms were identified in this study. This may be an epidemiological, observational, or survey-based study that reports associations rather than proposing causal biological pathways.
Systematic Reviews & Meta-Analyses
Max 100Randomized Controlled Trials
Max 90Cohort Studies
Max 72Case-Control Studies
Max 58Cross-Sectional Studies
Max 44Case Reports & Case Series
Max 30Expert Opinion & Narrative Reviews
Max 536 / 72
Evidence Score
Groups of people are followed over time to see who develops an outcome. Strong for identifying risk factors and associations, but cannot prove causation as firmly as RCTs.
Not medical advice. For informational purposes only. Always consult a healthcare professional. Terms
Runners who train a lot have less dangerous types of heart plaque and their arteries open wider with a special medicine, but they still might have narrow arteries.
No biological mechanisms were identified in this study. This may be an epidemiological, observational, or survey-based study that reports associations rather than proposing causal biological pathways.
Systematic Reviews & Meta-Analyses
Max 100Randomized Controlled Trials
Max 90Cohort Studies
Max 72Case-Control Studies
Max 58Cross-Sectional Studies
Max 44Case Reports & Case Series
Max 30Expert Opinion & Narrative Reviews
Max 536 / 72
Evidence Score
Groups of people are followed over time to see who develops an outcome. Strong for identifying risk factors and associations, but cannot prove causation as firmly as RCTs.
Publication
Authors
Feuchtner GM, Langer C, Senoner T, Barbieri F, Beyer C, Bonaros N, Schachner T, Friedrich G, Baldauf B, Taylor CA, Klauser A, Rauch S, Leipsic J, Dichtl W, Widmann G, De Cecco CN, Plank F
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Claims (6)
Chronic high-volume endurance exercise is associated with the development of calcified coronary artery plaque, which is biomechanically more stable and less prone to rupture than non-calcified or mixed plaque.
People who train hard and regularly for endurance sports are less likely to have dangerous, unstable plaque in their heart arteries that could suddenly cause a heart attack.
People who regularly do long, intense workouts like running or cycling tend to have less dangerous types of plaque buildup in their heart arteries than people who don't exercise much.
When given a medicine that opens up heart arteries, endurance athletes show a much bigger increase in artery space relative to heart muscle size than non-athletes, which might mean their arteries respond better to the drug.
Even though endurance athletes have less dangerous soft plaque, their amount of hard, calcified plaque in the heart arteries is about the same as in people who don’t exercise.