Combat Sitting: How to Stay Active and Healthy

In today’s fast-paced world, many spend long hours sitting, whether at a desk, commuting, or relaxing at home. As your primary care doctors in Jupiter, Florida, we want to help you understand the health risks of prolonged sitting and how to counteract them with regular exercise.

Health Risks of Prolonged Sitting

Extended sitting can lead to several health issues, including:

  • Heart Disease: Increased risk of heart disease and stroke.
  • Obesity: A slower metabolism can lead to weight gain.
  • Diabetes: Impaired blood sugar regulation increases diabetes risk.
  • Back and Neck Pain: Poor posture and musculoskeletal issues.

Recommended Exercise to Offset Sitting

Balancing sedentary periods with physical activity is crucial. Here’s what you need to know:

  • Moderate Exercise: Aim for 150-300 minutes of moderate-intensity weekly aerobic activity, such as brisk walking or cycling.
  • Vigorous Exercise: Alternatively, 75-150 minutes of vigorous-intensity exercise like running can be effective.
  • Strength Training: Include strength training exercises at least two days a week.
  • Frequent Breaks: Take short breaks every 30 minutes to stand and stretch.

Practical Tips for Staying Active

Incorporating more physical activity into your daily routine doesn’t have to be difficult. Here are some tips:

  • Set a Timer: Use an alarm to remind yourself to move every 30 minutes.
  • Desk Exercises: Perform simple desk exercises like leg lifts and stretches.
  • Walk and Talk: Take phone calls or virtual meetings while walking.
  • Active Commutes: Walk or bike to work, or park further away to increase your steps.
  • Join a Fitness Class: Look for local classes in Jupiter, such as yoga or Pilates.

Our Commitment to Your Health

Our primary care office in Jupiter, Florida, is dedicated to helping you maintain a healthy lifestyle. If you have concerns about your sitting habits or need personalized exercise advice, reach out to us. Together, we can create a plan that supports your long-term health.

Remember, small changes can make a big difference. By staying active and mindful of your sitting habits, you can improve your well-being and reduce health risks. Let’s take the first step towards a healthier, more active lifestyle today!

Nature Can Heal in More Ways Than One

Humans evolved in the natural world. We may have retreated to caves or huts to protect ourselves from the elements, but we spent much of our time outdoors, hunting, gathering, cooking, telling stories, and so on. Our lives these days, though, are largely spent cut off from nature.

This way of life has sparked a wealth of studies showing that our loss of contact with nature—dubbed “nature deficit disorder”—has a real impact on our physical and mental health.

So our primary care concierge doctors in Jupiter weren’t too surprised to learn of a new study published this month in the journal Occupational & Environmental Medicine, which found that enjoying nature up to four times a week reduced the odds of needing mental health medications by 33 percent.

It also reduced the odds of using blood pressure pills by 36 percent and asthma medications by 26 percent.

The Study

Researchers interviewed about 6,000 people who live in large cities in Finland, asking about their access to and use of green and blue spaces, including parks, zoos, rivers, lakes, or the sea. 

They also asked subjects whether they could see views of nature from their homes, how often they spent time outdoors as well as how much they exercised while outdoors.

The study also accounted for other possible factors such as traffic-related outdoor air pollution and noise, which have been proven to have an adverse effect on health.

Respondents were then asked about their use of medications for depression, anxiety, high blood pressure, asthma, or insomnia, and correlated these with time spent in nature.

As noted above, the results were markedly better for those who were regularly exposed to green or blue spaces. Notably, those who lived in areas with a lot of green spaces or who simply looked at nature from their windows showed no improvement in any of these categories.

“Frequent green space visits, but not the amounts of residential green or blue spaces, or green and blue views from home, were associated with less frequent use of psychotropic, antihypertensive, and asthma medication in urban environments,” the study authors wrote.

Confirming Prior Research

Numerous earlier studies have found significant benefits from spending time in nature.

One meta-review of 143 other studies published in the journal Environmental Research, for example, found that people with access to green space generally had a slower heart rate, lower blood pressure, and fewer blood levels of the stress hormone cortisol. Researchers also found significantly fewer cases of diabetes and lower rates of mortality from heart disease in the group regularly exposed to nature.

An American Institutes for Research (AIR) study in 2005 found that sixth-grade students who attended three outdoor education programs showed marked improvement in conflict resolution skills.

Another study in China in 2013 involved 60,000 children between the ages of two and 17. It showed that regular exposure to nature, or “greenness” around their schools, reduced the incidence of attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). A more recent study at the University of Illinois produced similar results.

And a 2016 study of nearly 100,000 women conducted over eight years found that having access to the greenest space not only improved the subjects’ mental health but also reduced their death rate by 12 percent.

Nature Deprivation Hurts

Author Richard Louv coined the phrase Nature Deficit Disorder (NDD) in his 2005 book “Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature Deficit Disorder.” In it, he argued that elements of our urbanized lifestyle, including few natural spaces, a car-focused culture, more screen time, changes in the perception of risk (e.g., fear of “stranger danger”), less leisure time, and increased time pressure from work or school, combine to decrease or even eliminate contact with nature for both adults and children, according to the National Institutes for Health (NIH).

“The average young American now spends practically every minute—except for the time in school—using a smartphone, computer, television, or electronic device,” Tamar Lewin reported in a Kaiser Family Foundation study on the subject.

According to the Children and Nature Network (C-NN), which was co-founded by Louv, an expanding body of scientific evidence suggests that nature-deficit disorder contributes to:

  • diminished use of the senses
  • attention difficulties
  • conditions of obesity, and
  • higher rates of emotional and physical illnesses

Make the Connection

Unfortunately, to get back to nature, you may need to make a specific effort, because in our harried lives trapped indoors, focused on our screens, we have very little time for real relaxation.

Therefore, it’s often necessary to add nature breaks to our schedules the same way we schedule everything else.

One way is to undertake the Japanese practice known as “forest bathing,” or shinrin-yoku. As Kaiser Permanente’s’ online Thrive explains, “Heading out to a heavily wooded area isn’t required. You could take a trip to a nearby park, your favorite local trail, the beach, or any natural setting. Just be sure to turn off or silence your phone or other devices.”

Psychology Today explains, “Forest bathing is an antidote to pinging distractions, impending deadlines, and never-ending obligations . . . . The idea is to immerse yourself in a natural environment and soak up the many health benefits of being in the green woods.”

However, you manage it, for the sake of your overall health we recommend you take the time to reconnect with the natural world as often as possible.

Doctor’s Best Diets for the New Year

At the beginning of every new year, it’s customary to make resolutions to improve our lives in some way. Usually near the top of the list of New Year’s resolutions the goal of losing weight. Our primary care concierge doctors in Jupiter certainly applaud that one, because obesity negatively impacts our health in so many areas, from the possibility of type 2 diabetes to heart disease. 

But there are other reasons to adhere to a particular type of diet, which don’t necessarily relate to weight loss. Diet in this sense means a way of eating, whether it’s cultural or just for overall health.

Forbes 2023 Rankings

Forbes Health recently consulted a team of seven nutrition experts to rate 19 diets considering a range of factors, from weight loss to heart health. 

Which one is best for you depends on your reason for trying a new diet. Of the 19 diets reviewed, these made the top 10:

  • Best for overall health: Mediterranean diet, emphasizing fresh fruits, olive oil, nuts, and fish
  • Best non-meat diet: vegetarian, which generally doesn’t allow meat, poultry, or fish
  • Best for heart health: dietary approaches to stop hypertension (DASH) diet, which focuses on fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean proteins, and low-fat dairy
  • Best commercial diet: Weight Watchers (now known as WW), emphasizing lower calories, with coaching and group support
  • Best commercial diet runner-up: Noom, an app that ranks food according to calories, with coaching and group support
  • Best non-meat diet runner-up: vegan, which allows no animal products of any kind
  • Best diet for flexibility: pescatarian, a type of vegetarianism that also allows fish and other seafood
  • Best diet for holistic health: Ornish diet, low-fat emphasis allowing no meat, fish, or poultry
  • Best diet for a brain boost: MIND diet, a combination of the Mediterranean and DASH diets
  • Best diet for a nutrient boost: Nordic diet, consisting primarily of fish, berries, and winter vegetables, with a small amount of meat and sweets allowed

Other Views

The annual US News listing of best diets includes most of the above diets, in addition to Jenny Craig, Dr. Weil’s anti-inflammatory diet, the Mayo Clinic diet, volumetrics, the nutritarian diet, the South Beach diet, and the Plantstrong diet.

Everyone, it seems, has an opinion on what makes a great diet.

For instance, Dr. Michael Greger told NBC’s TODAY that the worst diet is what he terms the CRAP diet: “calorie-rich and processed foods” that make health problems worse and weight loss impossible.

Instead, he recommends consuming a whole-food, plant-based diet, which is naturally high in fiber and low in calorie density and allows people to eat as much as they want—no calorie counting or portion control needed.

“It’s a diet that minimizes the intake of meat, eggs, dairy, and processed junk, and maximizes the intake of fruits, vegetables, legumes like beans, whole grains, nuts and seeds, mushrooms—basically, real food that grows out of the ground. Those are our healthiest choices,” he told TODAY.

“The strategy is to improve the quality of food rather than restricting the quantity of food,” he added, “so it doesn’t leave you hungry. That’s a diet you can stick with. You get a boost of energy, better digestion, better sleep.”

Skip the Gimmicks

His approach is simple. And in contrast, notice what kinds of diets don’t show up on any of these lists.

The hugely popular keto diet is one example. Studies show that 80 percent of those who try it struggle to stick with it. Why, when it often results in huge and rapid amounts of weight loss?

Because it not only can it cause numerous side effects—body aches, headaches, light-headedness, nausea, fatigue and lethargy, constipation, and brain fog—but because everyone else is eating garlic bread and mashed potatoes (not cauliflower) with gravy and pasta. 

Because, in short, the keto diet is restrictive. It has a long list of very tasty foods that either aren’t allowed or are allowed only in small portions after a certain time.

“When you are on the keto diet, you drastically cut your carbs to only 20 per day. That’s less than one apple!” nutritionist Lisa Drayer, a CNN contributor, told the network.

Bottom Line

Above all, research shows that the most successful diet is the one that you yourself designed because it gives you a sense of control, rather than being at the mercy of a set of restrictive rules.

“You have to have joy and pleasure in food,” Stanford University professor of medicine Christopher Gardner told The Washington Post. He has conducted numerous randomized trials to test the success rate of various diets and found they are essentially the same.

“They agree more than they disagree,” he said. Instead, he counsels, “Limit added sugars and refined grains, and eat more non-starchy vegetables. [I]f you do those two things, you get 90 percent of the benefits.” 

If you enjoy what you eat, you’ll have a much better chance of sticking with it for the rest of your life, he added.

concierge doctors exercise effects

Exercise Is the Best Medicine

Your concierge family practice doctors at MD 2.0 in Jupiter, Florida, realize that to some people “exercise” is a chore. But study after study demonstrates the health benefits of regular movement, as well as the dangers of little-to-no exercise.

 

The danger of not exercising

Here’s another study that underscores the dangers of the sedentary lifestyle. Published last month in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), this one found that a lack of regular exercise is as detrimental to health as smoking, diabetes, and heart disease.

“Being unfit on a treadmill or in an exercise stress test has a worse prognosis, as far as death, than being hypertensive, being diabetic or being a current smoker,” Dr. Wael Jaber, a cardiologist at the Cleveland Clinic, told CNN. The senior author of  the study, he called the results “extremely surprising.”

“We’ve never seen something as pronounced as this and as objective as this,” he added. “[Being unfit] should be treated almost as a disease that has a prescription, which is called exercise.”

Researchers investigated 122,007 former patients at Cleveland Clinic who were tested on a treadmill between January 1, 1991 and December 31, 2014. They found those with the lowest level of fitness, i.e., a sedentary lifestyle, had a risk of death almost 500 percent higher than those who were the most physically fit.

This is only the latest study to document the danger of the sedentary lifestyle. Here are just a few others:

  • A Texas study published in January found that for people over 50, regular exercise reversed the effects of aging, including hardening of the arteries and less efficient heart muscle action.
  • Another showed a 40 percent decrease in cancer deaths among those who were more active than their sedentary counterparts.
  • In the famous Nurses’ Health Study, those who exercised for a half-hour or more a day halved their risk of heart attack and stroke.
  • Another Texas study found that men who were considered physically active lowered their stroke risk by two-thirds.

There are many others, and they all reach similar conclusions: A lifestyle that includes little physical exercise is deadly.

 

Too late to start?

But what if you’re no longer in the so-called “prime of life”? It’s a little late to bother with exercise, isn’t it? The answer is a resounding no. One study published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology tracked the progress of 33,000 Swedish men from 1998 to 2012 who began exercising at an average of age 60. They reduced their risk of heart failure by 21 percent.

The important thing to remember when starting an exercise routine later in life is to start slowly, don’t push yourself, and work your way up to maximum fitness level. You may never compete in the Olympics, but you’ll notice improvements in every area of your life.

 

Benefits of exercise

Whatever age you begin regular exercise, you’ll begin to notice the positive effects within days. According to the Mayo Clinic, here just 10 of the many benefits of regular aerobic exercise:

  1. Losing weight and keeping it off
  2. Increased stamina
  3. Warding off viral illnesses like colds and flu
  4. Reduced risk of obesity, heart disease, high blood pressure, type 2 diabetes, stroke and certain types of cancer
  5. Control of chronic conditions including coronary artery disease
  6. Strengthening the heart muscle to slow the pulse, pump blood more efficiently, and improve blood flow to the entire body
  7. Boost the “good” cholesterol (high-density lipoproteins or HDL) while lowering “bad” cholesterol (low-density lipoproteins or LDL) helping to reduce plaque buildup in the arteries
  8. Reducing tension, anxiety, and depression
  9. Helping maintain mobility and brain function in older age
  10. Living longer.

We cannot stress this enough: Regular exercise is vital to your overall health and well-being. If you’re tired of feeling tired and dealing with various aches and pains, pick an exercise and go for it. Just be sure to check with us first.

steps for womens health

Steps Women Can Take For Good Health at Any Age

Your concierge family practice doctors at MD 2.0 in Jupiter, Florida, would like to remind you that this week is the 19th annual National Women’s Health Week, when an alliance of government organizations spearheaded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) calls attention to the ways women can improve their health.

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