Effect of 8-week resistance trainings in different environmental conditions on endothelial progenitor cells and some cardiovascular risk factors in overweight men

Background: Vascular endothelial dysfunction is pathological conditions that may be due to complications of obesity in various arteries. The purpose of this study was to investigate the effect of 8 weeks resistance training in different environmental conditions on endothelium progenitor cells (EPCS) (Marker of CD34), oxidized-LDL (oxLDL) and C-reactive protein (CRP) in overweight men.

Methods: For this Purpose, 30 overweigh male students in Kermanshah city with the mean age of 19.8± 1.13 yr participated in this study, voluntarily. Subjects randomly assigned into 3 groups including hypoxic and normoxic resistance training, and hypoxic exposure. Participants performed the protocols 3 days per week for 8 weeks with 70% of 1RM. The oxLDL, CRP, and CD34 were measured before and after the intervention. T-test, one-Way ANOVA, Wilcoxon and Kruskal-Wallis tests were used to analyzing the data.

Results: There was a significant decrease in CRP and oxLDL levels in the hypoxic resistance (P=0.001, P=0.005), normoxic resistance (P=0.003, P=0.013) and hypoxic exposure (P=0.003, P=0.005), respectively. However, no significant difference was observed between variations of the groups. The cells of CD34 was increased after the hypoxic resistance (P=0.005), normoxic resistance (P=0.005), and hypoxia exposure (P=0.004). No significant difference was observed between variations of the groups.

Conclusion: Considering the similar effects of hypoxic exposure with other groups on study variables, it may be possible to use hypoxic exposure as a beneficial manner for some overweight individuals at the injury and special circumstances.