The association of physical activity and colorectal and breast cancer : The Fifth Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (2008-2011)

• Published in: Journal of exercise rehabilitation Vol. 11; no. 3; pp. 155 - 160
• Main Author: Kang, Suh-Jung
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Korea (South) Korean Society of Exercise Rehabilitation 01.06.2015; 한국운동재활학회
• Subjects: Original; 심리과학; Physical activity; Breast cancer; Colorectal cancer
• ISSN: 2288-176X; 2288-1778
• DOI: 10.12965/jer.150200

Therapeutic importance of physical activity during and after cancer treatment has been supported. To examine the patterns of physical ac-tivity according to the stages of breast and colorectal cancer survivor-ship in Korean, Korean National Health and Nutrition Examination Sur-vey data from 2008 to 2011 were used. International Physical Activity Questionnaire (IPAQ) was utilized to estimate weekly time spent in vig-orous- and moderate-intensity physical activity, and walking, and to calculate MET-minute/week. Depending on the survivorship, the sub-jects were categorized into “never diagnosed with cancer” (group 1), “0-4 yr since cancer diagnosis” (group 2), and “5 or more years since cancer diagnosis” (group 3), separately for colorectal and breast can-cer. The associations between physical activity and the cancer survi-vorship were studied. Following results were obtained: (1) Breast can-cer (n=10,167, mean age=48.55±16.27): The mean physical activity lev-els expressed in MET-minutes/week were 2,064.83, 1748.82, and 1998.36 in groups 1, 2, and 3, respectively. Even though cancer survivors tended to be less active compared to people without cancer, there were no statistically significant difference among the three groups. (2) Colorectal cancer (n=17,270, mean age=48.62): MET-minutes/week was 2064.30, 1084.83, and 709.04 36 in groups 1, 2, and 3, respectively. The differences were significant between group 1 and 2 (F=5.87, P=0.016) and group 1 and 3 (F=28.99, P<0.001). Despite potential therapeutic benefits of physical activity, colorectal cancer survivors were less active than peo-ple without cancer in Korea.