Research Fall Prevention Research:

The "Frailty and Injuries: Cooperative Studies of Intervention Techniques" (FICSIT),1 was conducted by the National Institute on Aging and the National Center for Nursing Research between 1990 and 1994. This study demonstrated that elderly participants in a T'ai Chi program had 47.5% fewer falls when compared with a similar group using computerized balance equipment. After learning and using T'ai Chi exercises only 8% of the participants still reported a fear of falling, as opposed to 23% prior to the intervention. There was less loss of upper body strength in the T'ai Chi group during the course of the study, as measured by left-hand grip strength. TheT'ai Chi group had lowered systolic blood pressure after a 12-minute walk. At another FICSIT research site, balance and weight training were used, followed by six months of T'ai Chi instruction. The strength and balance gained during this combined training were maintained successfully using only one session per week ofT'ai Chi.2

Incorporating Principles of T'ai Chi for Elderly Balance by Robert Levine, Advance magazine, May 21, 2001

Other Research:

  • A 1999 study demonstrated that T'ai Chi can improve the vestibular balance symptom of dizziness.3
  • Research done in 1996 comparing elderly T'ai Chi practitioners with a sedentary group found that the T'ai Chi group showed 19% higher peak oxygen uptake in comparison with their sedentary counterparts."
  • In 1989 a study demonstrated that practicing T'ai Chi significantly increases the immune system.4
  • Johns Hopkins University researcher Deborah Young reaffirmed in a 1988 study that T'ai Chi positively reduction of systolic blood pressure.5

Endnotes:

1Province MA, Hadley EA, Hornbrook MC et al: The effects of exercise on falls in elderly patients: a preplanned meta-analysis of the FICSIT trials. JAMA 273:1341-1347, 1995.

2 Wolfson L, Whipple R, Derby C et al: Balance and strength training in older adults: intervention gains and T ai Chi maintenance. J Am Geriatr Soc 44:498-506, 1996.

3 Hain TC, Fuller L et al: Effects of T'ai Chi on balance. Arch Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg (125)11:1191-5, 1999.

4 Xushing S, Yugi X, Yunjian X. Determination of e-rosette-forming lymphocytes in aged subjects with T'ai Chi Quan exercise. Int J Sports Med 1989; 10:217-219.

5 Reported in the May 11, 1998 LA Times in a Fitness column entitled "T'ai Chi as effective as aerobics in study on hypertension", by Carol Krucoff.

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