WALKING EXERCISE AND BLOOD PRESSURE AMONG ELDERLY WITH HYPERTENSION IN A NURSING HOMES
Evi Lailiya, Budi Widiyanto, Muhamad Jauhar

Health Polytechnic of Ministry of Health Semarang

Abstract

Background: Hypertension was become a global health problem because its prevalence increased significantly every year. This is caused by several factors, such as an unhealthy lifestyle and lack of physical exercise. The impacts was chronic kidney disease, coronary heart disease, stroke, and even death. One of complementary therapy that can control blood pressure was walking exercise. This study aims to determine the effect of walking exercise on blood pressure among the elderly with hypertension in a nursing homes.
Method : The research applied quasi-experimental type of pre-test and post-test without control group. There were totally 32 elderly selected by purposive sampling based on inclusion and exclusion criteria. The instruments was used sphygmomanometer aneroid type and stethoscope. Walking exercise was given in 3 times a week with 30 minutes per session. Data analysis was used paired t-test.
Results: The results shows that there was effect of walking exercise to reduce blood pressure among the elderly with hypertension significantly with a p value of 0,000 (p <0.05).
Conclusion: There are differences in blood pressure before and after walking exercise. This intervention can be used as an complementary therapy. Walking exercise was easier, simple and independently physical activities. So can be integrated in non-communicable disease program in primary health care services.

Keywords: elderly, hypertension, nursing homes, walking exercise

Topic: Mental Health, Community, Family Health and Gerontological Nursing