Associations of Daily Walking Time With Pneumonia Mortality Among Elderly Individuals With or Without a Medical History of Myocardial Infarction or Stroke: Findings From the Japan Collaborative Cohort Study

BACKGROUND: The association between daily walking and pneumonia mortality, stratified by the presence of disease conditions, such as myocardial infarction (MI) or stroke, was investigated. METHODS: The study participants were 22,280 Japanese individuals (9,067 men and 13,213 women) aged 65–79 years. Inverse propensity weighted competing risk model was used to calculate the hazard ratio (HR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) for pneumonia mortality. RESULTS: After a median of 11.9 years of follow-up, 1,203 participants died of pneumonia. Participants who did not have a history of MI or stroke and who walked for 1 hour/day or more were less likely to die from pneumonia (HR 0.90; 95% CI, 0.82–0.98) than those walked for 0.5 hours/day. A similar inverse association of pneumonia and walking (0.5 hours/day) was observed among participants with a history of MI (HR 0.66; 95% CI, 0.48–0.90). Among the participants with a history of stroke, those who walked for 0.6–0.9 hours/day were less likely to die because of pneumonia (HR 0.65; 95% CI, 0.43–0.98). CONCLUSIONS: Regular walking for ≥1 hour/day may reduce the risk of pneumonia mortality in elderly individuals with or without cardiovascular disease history.