A workout a day could keep the doctor away!
January 11, 2010 by Joe Gigantino
“Exercise can be used like a vaccine to prevent disease and a medication to treat disease. If there were a drug with the same benefits as exercise, it would instantly be the standard of care.”
~ Robert Sallis, M.D.
What if on your next visit to your health care provider, you were told to take a brisk 30 minute walk every day and call back in a week if you didn’t start feeling better. Would you feel slighted if you didn’t leave with a prescription to be filled? With more than half of Americans on at least one prescription drug (three if you are considered elderly), we are a society with a mindset of prescription drugs being our “fix” or our solution. Don’t get me wrong, I am not discounting the value of healthcare providers and taking drugs or over the counter medications when the situation calls for it. However, more and more people are realizing the value and multiple health benefits of exercise.
Even medical experts are now saying that being inactive or sedentary poses as great a health risk as smoking, contributing to heart disease, diabetes, hypertension, cancer, depression, arthritis and osteoporosis. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says 36% of U.S. adults didn’t engage in any leisure-time physical activity in 2008. That’s a bunch of couch potatoes, isn’t it?
Think you’re exempt from this if you are lean? Think again! Even lean men and women who are inactive are at higher risk of death and disease. While reducing obesity is an important goal, Dr. Robert Sallis, co-director of sports medicine at Fontana Medical Center says “the better message would be to get everyone to walk 30 minutes a day.” He went on to say, “We need to refocus the national message on physical activity, which can have a bigger impact on health than losing weight.” Of course, we know that when you are physically active on a regular basis, the natural result is losing or maintaining a healthy weight.
Studies have also found that exercise can lower blood pressure, reduce bad cholesterol, and reduce the incidence of type 2 diabetes. Want to be a more productive employee? Studies have also shown that subjects who walked briskly for 45 minutes, five days a week over 12 to 15 weeks had fewer and less severe upper respiratory tract infections, such as colds and flu. These subjects reduced their number of sick days 25% to 50% as compared with sedentary control subjects. What a great incentive for employers to offer health club memberships or fitness training programs to their employees!
There is good news that efforts are currently underway to get sedentary Americans moving. The Federal Government issued its first national exercise guidelines in 2008. Now it is working with a number of medical and fitness groups to develop a National Physical Activity plan, to be released early this year, to encourage Americans to adhere to the guidelines. Here are those guidelines:
- Adults get at least 2-1/2 hours per week of moderate-intensity physical activity, or one hour and 15 minutes a week of vigorous-intensity aerobic exercise, or an equivalent combination of both. The guidelines also say that additional health benefits can be had from as much as doubling the minimum recommendation for aerobic exercise.
- Also recommended: muscle-strengthening activities or weight training two or more days per week, which protects against a decline in bone mass, especially that experienced by post-menopausal women.
Examples of moderate activity can include ballroom and line dancing; biking on level ground or with a few hills; canoeing; gardening (raking, trimming shrubs); tennis (doubles); brisk walking; water aerobics.
Among vigorous-activity exercises are aerobic dance; biking faster than 10 miles an hour; heavy gardening (digging, hoeing); tennis (singles); jumping rope; swimming laps; hiking uphill; race walking, jogging or running. Daily postings on www.theworkout.com offer endless examples of free workout programs – both moderate and vigorous activity exercises.
On your next doctor visit, why not ask how exercise could benefit your particular health concerns? A survey by the ACSM, whose members include physicians and exercise-science professionals, found that only four out of 10 doctors talk to their patients about the importance and benefits of exercise, and they don’t always offer suggestions on the best ways to be physically active. It is crucial that you are proactive concerning your wellness. It’s time to have a serious talk with your healthcare provider as to what type of exercise programs would be the most beneficial for you.
You only have one life and one body, so the decisions you make today can make a total difference in the quality of your life tomorrow.
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