Abstract

Background & purpose: Hypertension is a common, chronic, age-related disease, which often leads to cardiovascular complications.  The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of moderate intensity aerobic exercises on blood coagulation and fibrinolysis factors in elderly hypertensive patients. Methods: fifty hypertensive male patients participated in the study with age range(55-65 years old), body mass index from 25 to 34.9 kg/m². The patients divided into study group and control group randomly. The study group performed moderate intensity aerobic exercises in the form of walking on electronic treadmill for 30 to 40 min., 3 session per week for 8 consecutive weeks plus medical treatment with fixed dose throughout the study period. while the control group took the medical treatment only without exercises. Laboratory investigation for measuring clotting time, plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 pre and post study, also recording systolic & diastolic blood pressure pre and post the study. Results: there was significant   increase in the clotting time of both groups in favor of the study group by 5.22% post study and there was significant decreasing effect in PAI-1 (P<0.05) in study and control groups in favor of the study group by 19.32%. while the study group had significant reduction of systolic and diastolic blood pressure compared with the control group (p<0.05). Conclusion: there is a beneficial effect of moderate intensity aerobic exercises in improving fibrinolysis process via reducing the plasminogen activator inhibitor-1, and increasing the clotting time as well as moderate aerobic exercises  had a significant effect in lowering arterial blood pressure in elderly hypertensives.