Physical activity is crucial to maintaining your overall health and wellbeing. This doesn’t mean running a marathon – there are many things that count towards physical activity such as walking, cycling, gardening or other incidental exercise, such as shopping or playing with your kids or grandkids.
Doing any physical activity is better than doing none, so if you’re unsure about what you can achieve, start with small amounts and slowly build up over time.
Staying active may become more difficult as your disease progresses, but it’s still very important. Try to factor physical activity into your routine wherever possible and think of it as part of your treatment.
Whatever stage of kidney disease you’re at, physical activity helps to:
- increase your energy levels
- keep your muscles strong
- maintain body weight
- control blood pressure
- control blood sugar
- reduce stress
- lift your mood and fight depression through the release of endorphins
- reduce your risk of heart problems by lowering ‘bad’ cholesterol, increasing ‘good’ cholesterol and reducing triglyceride level
- improve your sleep
- ease restless legs and muscle cramps.
You should always discuss any new activity with your doctor before you start. They may refer you to an exercise physiologist or practitioner that can develop an appropriate activity plan for you.
If you’re wondering how often you should do physical activity, and for how long, Australian guidelines (for adults aged 18-64) suggest:
- aim to be active on most, preferably all, days of the week
- 150-300 minutes of moderate activity per week (e.g. walking, gardening, using the stairs instead of the lift) or 75-150 minutes of vigorous activity (e.g. jogging, circuit class, weights)
- do muscle strengthening activities twice per week.
- try to break up long periods of sitting as often as possible.
If you are over 65, we recommend reviewing these guidelines that cater to your age group.
If you want to lose weight, you may need to do some longer sessions (45-60 minutes) of moderate to higher intensity exercises. Moderate intensity examples include brisk walking, swimming, social tennis, or dancing. Higher intensity examples include aerobics, jogging and many competitive sports. These activities make you breathe harder or puff and pant (depending on fitness).
It’s important to be in tune with your own body. If you experience any of the following signs, stop what you are doing, cool down and notify your doctor.
- chest pain or pressure
- dizziness or feeling light-headed
- irregular or very fast heart rate
- excessive shortness of breath
- nausea
- severe leg cramps
- pain or pressure in the neck or jaw
- excessive tiredness
- blurring vision.
Exercise and dialysis
There is a growing evidence that physical activity is beneficial for people on dialysis and may help to prevent negative side effects associated with treatment. While there are a few special considerations, you can do any activity you can tolerate.
- Ensure you protect any tubes or veins you use for dialysis. If you’re unsure, talk to your healthcare team or occupational therapist about how you can protect them.
- If you have a catheter, it’s recommended you do not swim. If swimming is important to you, ask your dialysis healthcare team about your options.
- If your stomach is full of peritoneal dialysis fluid, physical activity could be uncomfortable or cause a leak. Talk to your healthcare team for advice on how you can stay safe.
Sometimes there is exercise equipment at your dialysis unit that you can use, such a pedal machine or resistance bands. Resistance bands are great for improving muscle strength and you can even reference the handy prompt cards to use them while in your dialysis chair.
You can also refer to the video below.
If your unit doesn’t have resistance bands, you can buy them from health and fitness stores, or online. As always, discuss your interest in them with your healthcare team before attempting any of the exercises.
For further tips on how to stay active on dialysis, you can download our Exercise on Dialysis instruction manual.
