Analysis of the impact of exercise education interventions on middle-aged and elderly people in Central-western rural China

This study aims to analyze the impact of health education effort that promote exercise activities have had on middle-aged and older people in central-western rural China. The Project for Family Health Care (PFHC) of the population in central and western China used questionnaires completed anonymously to survey 4217 randomly selected respondents in the baseline year of 2011, and 4529 in the end-line year of 2015. We used bivariate and multivariate analyses to examine the associations between several factors and regular exercise activities. The 2011 baseline year sample indicated that 90.5% of respondents knew the functions of regular exercise, but that only 45.4% participated in regular exercise activities. In the baseline multivariate model, a number of factors were positively associated with the prevalence of participation in regular exercise activities. Respondents who were women, older, retired, lived with children, had chronic diseases, and self-reported better health were more likely to participate in regular exercise. The proportion of those participating in regular exercise increased to 75.9% among the end-line year respondents after health education. This study revealed that health education interventions effectively encouraged rural middle-aged and elderly people to participate in regular exercise activities. Health education efforts of this sort for rural middle-aged and older adults should be further strengthened, and more public facilities for exercise should be provided.