Health benefits of traditional Chinese sports and physical activity for older adults

For more than 5000 years, many forms of traditional sports and exercise activities have been widely practiced in China.

For centuries, older Chinese adults have used these   ctivities to help enhance their fitness, promote their health, and prevent disease. Many of these activities are culturally rooted, with their social and spiritual health values being important among different ethnic populations. Despite this rich and varied history, a systematic review of the health benefits of many traditional sports and physical activities (PAs) for an older Chinese adult population has not been conducted.

Increased longevity and low fertility rates in China have led to the aging of the Chinese population,which has increased the burden of disease and disability on the country’s healthcare system.Therefore, from a health and disease prevention perspective, promoting lifestyle changes, including an increase in levels of PA, is urgently needed for older adults. Despite the fact that the Chinese have a long history of using traditional sports and fitness-oriented PAs to improve health, the benefits of these activities have been both under-documented and under-studied.This has created a significant knowledge gap in the area of health promotion for China’s aging population.