Women's physical activity patterns: nursing implications.

OBJECTIVE

To develop a method of categorizing patterns of physical activity by describing the frequency, intensity, and duration of women's activities.

DESIGN

A 24-cell quota sample stratified by four occupations, two races, and three age groups.

SETTING

Ten employment sites.

PARTICIPANTS

One hundred seventy-six women, ages 35-65 years, who worked 20 or more hours per week at their job, were not currently using hormone replacement therapy, not pregnant, and did not have a hysterectomy before the age of 53.

MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES

An interviewer and self-administered, retrospective occupational, household, and leisure physical activity questionnaire covering the previous 12 months and lifelong activity.

RESULTS

Five patterns of household and leisure physical activity were identified: vigorous, continuous, cumulative, occasional, and inactive. Participation in the vigorous pattern was low, but 34% followed a continuous pattern of leisure activity and 75% followed a continuous pattern of household activity. The number of weekly work hours did not affect the household or leisure pattern.

CONCLUSION

Women may be able to obtain the recommended levels of physical activity from a combination of occupational, household, and leisure activities. Nursing recommendations should guide women to increase their regular leisure physical activity and/or accumulate sessions of moderate-intensity activity by aerobically enhancing daily activities in which they already participate.