abstract
- Weight loss therapy to improve health in obese older adults is controversial because it causes further bone loss. Therefore, it is recommended that weight loss therapy should include an intervention such as exercise training (ET) to minimize bone loss. The purpose of this study was to determine the independent and combined effects of weight loss and ET on bone metabolism in relation to bone mineral density (BMD) in obese older adults. One-hundred-seven older (age >65 years) obese (body mass index [BMI] ? 30 ?kg/m(2) ) adults were randomly assigned to a control group, diet group, exercise group, and diet-exercise group for 1 year. Body weight decreased in the diet (-9.6%) and diet-exercise (-9.4%) groups, not in the exercise (-1%) and control (-0.2%) groups (between-group p? < ?0.001). However, despite comparable weight loss, bone loss at the total hip was relatively less in the diet-exercise group (-1.1%) than in the diet group (-2.6%), whereas BMD increased in the exercise group (1.5%) (between-group p?