Unable to touch your toes? You could have a five times higher risk of death compared to those who can, a study suggests.
Data from over 3,000 middle-aged people found those who found the exercise difficult had a far higher chance of dying within a decade compared to those who were more supple.
Brazilian researchers assessed the flexibility of participants in a study using a system called Flexindex.
This examines how people can stretch in 20 ways using seven different joints, with some examples including being able to touch your toes, being able to touch the back of your left shoulder with your right hand over your head.
At the end of the tests people are given a total score of between 0 and 80.
Brazilian researchers assessed the flexibility of participants in a study using a system called Flexindex (stock image)
In the most recent analysis, published in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports, experts found people aged 46 to 65 with higher Flexindex scores had between two and five better odds of surviving the next decade.
Of the 3,000 plus participants included in the analysis about one in 10 were dead at its conclusion.
Survivors had an almost 10 per cent higher Flexindex score compared to those who died, the authors, from the Exercise Medicine Clinic – CLINIMEX, in Rio de Janeiro, said.
This translated into women with a low Flexindex score having an almost five times higher risk of dying.
Men with a low score had almost twice the risk once factors like age, obesity and existing health conditions into account.
Dr Claudio Gil S. Araújo, an author on the paper, said: ‘Being aerobically fit and strong and having good balance have been previously associated with low mortality.
‘We were able to show that reduced body flexibility is also related to poor survival in middle-aged men and women.’
He added that as flexibility tends to decrease as we age, people may wish to include stretching exercises into their routine and medics may wish to flexibility assessments in physical health evaluations.
The NHS also advises that improving flexibility may help lower the risk of injury.
Flexibility, alongside aspects like balance, is considered one of the signs of overall good physical health.
Maintaining the ability to move easily is one way to help avoid sarcopenia, the medical term for when muscle function becomes compromised with old age.
Such muscle weakness can lead to an increased risk of falls, one of the biggest causes of hospital admissions among the over 65s in the UK.
Over 200,000 falls admissions in this group were recorded in England alone in 2022/23, with 20,000 fall related deaths also recorded among the entire population in this time.
Such falls can lead to direct injury like bone fractures and the immobility and hospital stays during the recovery can also lead to people suffering further muscle weakness and health complications.
There were a number of limitations to the recent study.
One is that participants were primarily affluent and white which may limit the implications to other groups.
Another is that while poor flexibility was considered an indicator of increased risk of death in the study, the issue itself wasn’t what killed people, and what these factors may be wasn’t identified in the study.
A number of other tests, such as being able to stand on one leg for 10 seconds, have also previously been linked to increased protection against death.
