The effect of wearing compression garment on high-intensity exercise

Abstract

Compression garment is widely said to improve performance and shorten recovery time, however, there seem to be a few scientific evidences how it all actually works. The aim of this study is to clarify the effect of compression garment on body and mind during high intensity exercise. A long distance (10 km) running and a weight training (three sets of leg presses) was conducted on 14 subjects, measuring the change of heart rate, autonomic nerve, body surface temperature, hip joint angle, salivary amylase, hemoglobin concentration and oxygen saturation of lateral broad muscle. The measurements mentioned above were conducted on subjects wearing and not wearing compression garment. Obtained results show that the compression garment markedly increases the hemoglobin concentration in comparison to that of the subjects not wearing compression garment. Furthermore, it should be noted that the change in hip joint angle of subjects in compression garment is smaller than that of subjects without compression garment during traveling over long distances. On the other hand, there was no significant difference in autonomic nervous system and salivary amylase between subjects with/without compression garment. Consequently, compression garment has a physical effect from a viewpoint of hemoglobin concentration, but it does not have an outstanding mental effect. Moreover, a subsidiary effect of compression garment is found, i.e. compression garment decreases the flexibility of the hip joint movement resulting in the stability of the running form.