Postexercise Hypotension After Muscle Power Training Session in Older Adults With Hypertension

The aim of the present study was to determine the acute effects of a muscle power training (PT) session on arterial blood pressure (BP) in older adults with hypertension. Thirteen participants (64 +/- 4 years) with essential hypertension were randomly assigned to a PT session and control session without exercise. During PT, the participants performed three sets of eight repetitions at 50% of the one-repetition maximum tests. The concentric phase during each repetition was performed as fast as possible. The systolic BP (post-15 min: -1.7 +/- 1.8 mmHg [p = .048; d = 0.22]; post-30 min: -3.6 +/- 1.7 mmHg [p = .010; d = 0.48]; post-45 min: -3.3 +/- 1.3 mmHg [p = .002; d = 0.42]; post-60 min: -3.9 +/- 1.7 mmHg [p = .003; d = 0.49]) and diastolic BP (post-15 min: -1.5 +/- 1.5 mmHg [p = .053; d = 0.20]; post-30 min: -2.2 +/- 1.7 mmHg [p = .001; d = 0.29]; post-45 min: -2.0 +/- 2.0 mmHg [p = .001; d = 0.27]; post-60 min: -2.0 +/- 1.3 mmHg [p<.001; d = 0.26]) reductions were observed at all times after the PT session, compared with the preexercise and control session. PT is an effective strategy to acutely reduce BP in older patients with essential hypertension.