Abstract

Background: A single bout of physical exercises involving large muscle mass such as brisk walking has been reported to produce postexercise hypotension for up to 12 h, which helps in managing high blood pressure (BP), prevents abrupt rise in BP, and acts as a routine day-to-day stressor along the day.
Objective: To determine the short-term effects of isotonic handgrip exercise on BP in healthy adolescents, as the compliance of people for routine form of exercise for BP control has not been very encouraging, with the objective to find a user-friendly exercise that helps in reducing BP.
Materials and Methods: We examined an acute bout of isotonic handgrip exercise for postexercise hypotension by a study conducted on adolescents aged 17–19 years (N = 60, boys and girls—30 each). The participants performed a single bout of isotonic handgrip exercise using ball-squeeze dynamometer at an intensity of 30% maximum voluntary contraction (MVC) for 20 min at the rate 12 contractions/min. The BP measurement was conducted before the bout of the exercise (baseline), immediately at the end of exercise (PE-I), and at 1 h in the postexercise period (PE-1 h). Result: No significant difference was observed in the BP during PE-I and PE-1 h phases in both boys and girls. Conclusion: It can, thus, be concluded that a single bout of isotonic handgrip exercise, as prescribed in the study, is not efficient to produce postexercise hypotension. However, before considering isotonic handgrip exercise to be inefficient, studies can be conducted on large population to reassess the isotonic handgrip exercise for postexercise hypotension by varying the intensity, rate, and duration of the exercise.