Purpose: To examine the effects of a Tai Chi Chung (TCC) program, an efficiency approach, on anxiety and cardiovascular risk factors.
Design: A quasi-experimental study.
Setting: A community in Taipei City, Taiwan. Subjects. One hundred thirty-three adults aged 55 years and older. Intervention. Sixty-four participants (experimental group) attended a 60-minute Tai Chi exercise three times per week for 12 weeks, whereas 69 participants (control group) maintained their usual daily activities.
Measures: Anxiety states, systolic blood pressure (SBP), diastolic blood pressure (DBP), body mass index (BMI), and waist circumference (WC) were assessed at baseline, 6 weeks into the experiment, and 12 weeks into the experiment.
Analysis: Generalized estimating equations were used to evaluate the changes.
Results: Participants showed a greater drop in anxiety levels (β = -2.57, p = .001) and DBP (β = -7.02, p < .001) at the 12-week follow-up than did the controls. SBP significantly decreased in the 6-week follow-up and 12-week follow-up tests. The participants in the intervention achieved a greater drop in BMI at the 6-week and 12-week follow-up visits than the controls. The interventions demonstrated decreased average WC at the 6-week and 12-week follow-up visits as compared to the controls.
Conclusion: The results highlight the long-term benefits of a TCC program in facilitating health promotion by reducing anxiety and risk factors for cardiovascular diseases.