Title: Interventions to promote or maintain physical activity during and after the transition to retirement: evidence synthesis to inform recommendations for policy and practice.
Funder: Department of Health (England)

Abstract: Most people over the age of 50 in the UK are sedentary and the vast majority fail to meet current government guidelines on the amount of activity recommended for improving health [4]. Older people may reduce their level of physical activity when they move from paid work into retirement [212]. People who are less well off as well as those who have less choice over whether to retire or not are the most likely to experience a decline in activity at retirement [3]. Although we know that these problems exist in society we know less about what should be done to encourage people to be more active after they retire. Further the point of retirement presents a risk for widening health inequalities between social classes and so interventions in this area have the potential to address such inequalities.Currently available review evidence gives some indication that retirement (and the transition to retirement) represents a promising life stage for physical activity interventions [2131416] but does not shed much light on all the relevant factors; particularly around specific types of interventions and interventions for different population groups in different circumstances and states of health and experiencing very different paths to retirement. In particular the effectiveness of interventions and the implications of socioeconomic status on their effectiveness have yet to be considered together in one synthesis. In order to address this research gap we will conduct a meta-synthesis of physical activity interventions for older people not in paid employment part or full time and those about to leave paid employment. We will consider studies which report on the effectiveness of interventions but also studies which identify how the perceptions of both older people and service deliverers may act as facilitators or obstacles to successful outcomes following intervention. Further we will aim to understand how encouraging physical activity after retirement might potentially contribute to reducing health inequalities. We will generate a critical meta-synthesis of the evidence suitable to inform policy decisions and disseminate to relevant audiences.Systematic searches will be undertaken to identify recently published relevant studies as well as unpublished material (grey literature) where possible. Scoping workshops with key stakeholders will assist with developing the protocol and search strategies. Supplementary search methods such as contacting key authors will also be undertaken. Data will be analysed initially to generate a critical synthesis to answer each research question individually. Subsequently a meta-synthesis of findings will be generated to combine quantitative intervention effectiveness data with qualitative findings to generate key messages. The meta-synthesis will allow us to examine the effect of the social and cultural issues surrounding intervention effectiveness and acceptability including the impact on health inequalities. We have successfully implemented meta-synthesis methods in similar topic areas to generate policy relevant messages (e.g. physical activity promotion by GPs [18] and interventions to encourage walking/cycling [19]). Our findings and key messages will be validated and refined through stakeholder workshops to include older people of varying socioeconomic backgrounds service providers and funders and topic experts.


Research activity codes: 3.1 PRIMARY PREVENTION INTERVENTIONS TO MODIFY BEHAVIOURS OR PROMOTE WELL-BEING
Health categories: STROKE;CANCER AND NEOPLASMS;METABOLIC AND ENDOCRINE;CARDIOVASCULAR;ORAL AND GASTROINTESTINAL