PlayStreets

Helping women and girls improve their heart health through outdoor activities

According to the Heart and Stroke Foundation, women are five times more likely to die from heart disease than breast cancer.

New research from Queen’s University in Canada by Dr. Sarah Dobowolski with specialized medical teams comprising includes Kristin Côté, the coordinator of Kingston Gets Active, a community-wide coalition that promotes physical activity; Brittany McBeath, a master’s student at Queen’s University; and Dr. Lucie Lévesque, the research supervisor.
the research which Supported by a CIHR Trainee Award in Women’s Heart Health, shows the impact of external activities on women’s heart health and how this increases the efficiency of the heart muscle and heart activity in general.
Dr. Sarah and her team started by creating a video highlighting how girls and women share active outdoor play and share their personal experiences in the field.
Sarah said: “Many of the women who watched the video are very excited and we have been encouraged by them, and we hope that our efforts will motivate them to translate that knowledge into increased outdoor physical activity.
The research team has conducted a practical experiment in their city (Kingston, Ontario), and they called this activity “playstreets“, where one of the streets in the city is closed in cooperation with local authorities, creating an atmosphere of enjoyment and the smooth movement of people and the practice of street play without bothering them Cars and other vehicles.
This program has been published in many cities of the world, which has led to increased outdoor play as well as increased communication with the community, both of which are very important for heart health. Such as track ball, hockey, chalk painting, cycling, etc.
At the end of each exercise, the team collects qualitative data from people who have participated in playstreets, and through that data the research team diagnoses the effectiveness of these activities and their impact on people.
“playsteerts has improved the chances of girls and women getting physically active by accessing neighborhood streets, where women can engage in these activities with their family members,”said Kristin Côté .
The women and girls who participated in the street games said the activities promoted a sense of well-being and safety within their city’s neighborhoods. The team plans to increase street play in the city on an organized basis.
Sarah said: Through our research here in this city and through the data from the people who participated in street play events, we try to understand the overall benefit of these activities as a means of achieving positive social choice in the communities, and we hope that the statements we get from Improving the health of girls, women and the community as a whole in the future.