Effects of Olympic Combat Sports on Older Adults’ Health Status: A Systematic Review

Abstract

The aim of this systematic review was to analyse the studies centered on the effects of Olympic combat sports (OCS [i.e., boxing, fencing, judo, karate, taekwondo, wrestling]) on older adults’ physical-functional, physiological, and psychoemotional health status. The review comprised randomised-controlled trials with OCS interventions, including older adults (>60 years), and measures of physical-functional, physiological, and/or psychoemotional health. The studies were searched through SCOPUS, PubMed/MEDLINE, Web of Science, PsycINFO, and EBSCO databases until 5 January 2021. The PRISMA-P and TESTEX scales were used to assess the quality of the selected studies. The protocol was registered in PROSPERO (code: CRD42020204034). Twelve OCS intervention studies were found (scored ≥60% for methodological quality), comprising 392 females and 343 males (mean age: 69.6 years), participating in boxing, judo, karate, and taekwondo. The qualitative analysis revealed that compared to controls, OCS training improved muscle strength, cardiorespiratory capacity, agility, balance, movement, attention, memory, mental health, anxiety, and stress tolerance. Meta-analysis was available only for the chair stand test, and an improvement was noted after OCS training compared to control. In conclusion, OCS interventions improves older adults’ physical-functional, physiological, and psychoemotional health. Our systematic review confirms that OCS training has high adherence (greater than 80%) in older adults.

Effects of Olympic Combat Sports on Health-Related Quality of Life in Middle-Aged and Older People: A Systematic Review

“…The main result of our review indicates that interventions based on OCS produce beneficial changes and an improvement trend with a small and moderate ES in HRQoL in both male and female, healthy participants, participants with Parkinson's disease, and participants with breast cancer. This result reinforces the scientific literature that has reported a positive impact of martial arts and combat sports on the health status in different population groups (Bu et al, 2010;Origua Rios et al, 2018;Moore et al, 2020;Valdés-Badilla et al, 2021).…”

Effect of Regular Taekwondo Self-Defense Training on Oxidative Stress and Inflammation Markers in Postmenopausal Women

“…The results of this study showed that the 12-week Taekwondo self-defense training intervention positively improved physical fitness and was effective in modifying oxidative stress and levels of inflammation in postmenopausal women. The findings of this study support the results of a systematic review that concluded that Olympic combat sports, including Taekwondo, improved the physical-functional, physiological, and psychoemotional health of the elderly population [20].…”

Effectiveness of Olympic Combat Sports on Balance, Fall Risk or Falls in Older Adults: A Systematic Review

“…Such a scenario could provide the opportunity to promote PA that requires a limited number of participants in reduced spaces for its practice, such as Olympic combat sports (OCS). In this context, OCS (boxing, fencing, judo, karate, taekwondo, and wrestling) are PA strategies that allow the development of sports practice individually or in pairs in confined spaces through low-impact dynamic actions with moderate to vigorous intensities using the upper and lower limbs through attack and defense movements, choreographies or specific forms of the disciplines and that can be practiced without contact [ 19 , 20 ]. Likewise, OCS include education about falls and exercises to face them [ 21 ] within their basic primary contents and achieve an adherence greater than 80% in older adults who practice OCS [ 19 ].…”

“…In this context, OCS (boxing, fencing, judo, karate, taekwondo, and wrestling) are PA strategies that allow the development of sports practice individually or in pairs in confined spaces through low-impact dynamic actions with moderate to vigorous intensities using the upper and lower limbs through attack and defense movements, choreographies or specific forms of the disciplines and that can be practiced without contact [ 19 , 20 ]. Likewise, OCS include education about falls and exercises to face them [ 21 ] within their basic primary contents and achieve an adherence greater than 80% in older adults who practice OCS [ 19 ]. To the best of our knowledge, no review has attempted to summarize the currently available literature regarding the potential effects of OCS on balance, fall risk, or falls in older adults.…”

“…To the best of our knowledge, no review has attempted to summarize the currently available literature regarding the potential effects of OCS on balance, fall risk, or falls in older adults. Recent systematic reviews have reported improvements in physical–functional, physiological, and psychoemotional health in older adults who participated in interventions with OCS [ 19 ] and a better postural balance in adults who practiced hard martial arts such as taekwondo, judo, karate, soo bahkdo, and ving tsun, compared with groups that participated in dancing, football, running, walking, swimming, and cycling, or did not practice PA [ 20 ]. However, their results are not conclusive due to the diversity of data collection instruments reported by the studies [ 19 ] or due to half of the studies analyzed having a cross-sectional design [ 20 ], among other factors.…”