Goldilocks & Activity (Physical & Sexual)

Remember Goldilocks?  She wanted everything just right.  Size of her chair, temperature of her porridge, and firmness of her bed.  Something like that, right?  She didn't like extremes, whether too little or too much of anything.  In reading my posts, I'm sure you've gathered that I believe in the Goldilocks theory of medicine, whereby many of the measurable parameters need to be made just so for optimal health & wellbeing, as opposed to settling for just good enough.

I thought about this some more when I read a study just published in JAMA this week about physical & sexual activity.  It turns out that infrequent or episodic activity, whether physical or sexual in nature, could serve as a trigger for a heart attack or even sudden cardiac death (SCD), more than doubling, even quadrupling one's (relative) risk.  However, to put it into proper perspective, that extra hour of activity is estimated to account for just 2-3 additional heart attacks per 10,000 person-years & 1 more SCD per 10,000 person-years.

On the other hand, habituating oneself to regular activity was associated with the expected 30-45% decrease (relative) risk of cardiac events.  I can hear it now.  Gee, honey, the doctor says we have to have sex regularly to prevent me from having a heart attack.