Do soccer and Zumba exercise improve fitness and indicators of health among female hospital employees? A 12‐week RCT

Abstract

This randomized controlled study investigated the effectiveness of soccer and Zumba on fitness and health indicators in female participants recruited from a workplace. One hundred seven hospital employees were cluster-randomized to either a soccer group (SG), Zumba group (ZG), or control group (CG). Intervention effects for the two training groups were compared with CG. The training was conducted outside working hours as 2-3 1-h sessions per week for 12 weeks. Peak oxygen uptake (VO2peak ), fat percentage, fat mass, bone mineral content, and plasma osteocalcin were measured before and after the intervention period. Based on intention-to-treat-analyses, SG significantly improved the VO2peak relative to body mass (5%; P = 0.02) and decreased heart rate during 100-W cycle exercise (-7 bpm; P = 0.01), total body fat percentage (-1.1%; P = 0.002), and total body fat mass (-1.0 kg; P = 0.001) compared with CG. ZG significantly improved the VO2peak relative to body mass (5%; P = 0.03) and decreased total fat mass (-0.6 kg; P < 0.05) compared with CG. Plasma osteocalcin increased in SG (21%; P < 0.001) and ZG (10%; P = 0.01) compared with CG. The present study indicates that workplace initiated short-term soccer training as well as Zumba outside working hours may result in fitness and modest health benefits among female hospital employees.

Effects of soccer vs swim training on bone formation in sedentary middle-aged women

“…Indeed plasma osteocalcin, CTX-1 and PINP were elevated by 37-52 % with none of the participants having a lower value in all three bone turnover markers after training. Recently, it was shown that female hospital employees had a 21 % increase in resting plasma osteocalcin after 12 weeks of soccer training (Barene et al 2014a) and an increase of ~7 µg L −1 after 40 weeks (Barene et al 2014b) quite similar to the ~9 µg L −1 increase in the present study. Also untrained young women participating in a 16-week soccer training intervention displayed a 37 % increase in resting osteocalcin concentration (Jackman et al 2013).…”

Soccer and Zumba as health-promoting activities among female hospital employees: a 40-weeks cluster randomised intervention study

“…The 12-week effects have recently been reported (Barene et al, 2013). This article focuses on the physiological effects after 40 weeks of training.…”

“…In this context, a large number of group fitness concepts have been introduced aiming to recruit participants and motivate them to engage in sustained physical exercise. Recently, several commercialisation campaigns have been conducted promoting Zumba as an effective and highly motivational worldwide training concept (Luettgen, Foster, Doberstein, Mikat, & Porcari, 2012;Pérez & Greenwood-Robinson, 2009), but we are only aware of our previous study investigating the health effects of Zumba (Barene, Krustrup, Jackman, Brekke, & Holtermann, 2013). In the latter study, we observed that 12 weeks of 1-h twice-weekly sessions of soccer and/or Zumba significantly improved aerobic fitness and indicators of cardiovascular and skeletal health among female hospital employees (Barene et al, 2013).…”

“…Recently, several commercialisation campaigns have been conducted promoting Zumba as an effective and highly motivational worldwide training concept (Luettgen, Foster, Doberstein, Mikat, & Porcari, 2012;Pérez & Greenwood-Robinson, 2009), but we are only aware of our previous study investigating the health effects of Zumba (Barene, Krustrup, Jackman, Brekke, & Holtermann, 2013). In the latter study, we observed that 12 weeks of 1-h twice-weekly sessions of soccer and/or Zumba significantly improved aerobic fitness and indicators of cardiovascular and skeletal health among female hospital employees (Barene et al, 2013). However, to the best of our knowledge, no previous randomised controlled intervention study has examined the long-term physiological effects of soccer or Zumba initiated at the workplace.…”

Efekti Zumba Plesa Na Tjelesnu Kompoziciju I Poboljšanje Zdravlja Kod Žena

“…Slični rezultati dobijeni su kod osoba koje su uposlene, ali njihove aktivnosti su svedene na minimum. Tako u istraživanjima (Barene, et al 2013) koji su ispitivali efekte dvanaestonedeljnog Zumba fitnes programa na postotak masne mase i ukupnu količinu masne mase na uzorku žena zaposlenih u zdravstvenom sektoru. Aktivnosti su upražnjavale 2-3 sata nedeljno.…”