Recently in Health & Fitness News Category

Why Your Company Should Get a Corporate Membership at Club One Fitness

By Christen Cunningham on December 14, 2009 3:27 PM | No Comments
A study by American Sports Data found that workers who frequently exercise were absent from work only 2.11 days per year, compared to 3.06 days for inactive individuals.  So you get 50% less absenteeism if you have employees that workout regularly.  

If you are company in Severna Park and Millersville, think about investing in your employees in a way that is bound to come back to you in a good way.  Call Club One Fitness at 410-729-3900 and find out the type of corporate Club One Fitness plans we have available for your company. 

Keeping Healthy Employees

By Christen Cunningham on November 16, 2009 3:07 PM | No Comments
Business Week writes an article on how we can decrease health care costs in this country. 

I disagree with much of the article.  But there is one thing we all can agree upon: healthy employees make better employees and investments in wellness and physical health pay dividends.

Woman Are Getting Shorter and Fatter... and More Healthy

By Christen Cunningham on October 21, 2009 12:44 PM | No Comments
The journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published a study suggesting that women are evolving towards losing height, and gaining a little more weight. 

Shorter and fatter?  Not exactly an advertisement for evolution.  But here is the rub: women are also getting more healthy.  Women will have lower cholesterol and healthier hearts.  Women are also evolving towards having great ability to bear children as they get older and to delay getting menopause.

Interesting study.  I have no clue why women would be getting shorter and fatter.  But the rest is all good!

More Benefits to Boxing Class

By Christen Cunningham on July 7, 2009 5:04 PM | No Comments

A recently published article on CNNhealth.com looked at the many benefits to group boxing classes and boxing as a form of exercise in general.  The article touted boxing as an excellent form of exercise for cardiovascular endurance and increasing strength.  Boxing used to be thought of as a combat sport involving two combatants and four gloves swinging.  However, this is no longer the case.  Now, boxing is viewed as a great form of exercise, that when taught by a well-trained instructor, can be injury free and quite a calorie burner!  Add in the class environment and you have a recipe for success!  Group boxing classes are appealing to more and more women, so ladies, glove up and get ready to punch!

Do Calorie Counters Work?

By Christen Cunningham on June 23, 2009 12:24 PM | No Comments
The Wall Street Journal questions today whether calorie counters are accurate. 

I wear one often when I workout.  I've always assumed as an article of faith that they were inaccurate. But who cares?  I don't care if my scale is five pounds heavy or five pounds light as long as it is consistently five pounds heavy or five pounds light.  Similarly, I think calorie counters measure effort and work, regardless of what that work is.  

Calories burned is an unimportant statistic.  But as the Journal article points out, they are good for motivation, citing a three-month study of 57 people trying to lose weight that was published in the journal Obesity in 2007.  The study found that people who used the calorie counter with diet and exercising counseling lost 13.6 pounds, compared with only nine pounds for a control group who received only the counseling.

These mind games we all play with ourselves for motivation matter. Use any weapon you can find in your arsenal to get you to your most motivated place.  For many of us, this includes inaccurate calorie counters.

Mental Fitness Study

By Christen Cunningham on May 22, 2009 11:04 AM | No Comments
A recently published study led by investigators at Mayo Clinic and University of Southern California looked the effects of traditional mental stimulation through classwork against mental stimulation from a brain fitness software program.  The study concluded that simple mental stimulation will not bring about optimal brain fitness and that exercises that are scientifically designed are needed to drive clinically significant improvements in the brain.

The link for this article is to a PR release from a developer of brain fitness software which makes take this interpretation of the study with a grain of salt.  They have an economic horse in the race. But it certainly makes sense that mental fitness means attacking learning and keeping your brain fit with many different types of weapons.  When you think about it, there is a physical correlary: the training paradigm of muscle confusion.   

Jimmy Carter Working Out

By Christen Cunningham on May 18, 2009 3:34 PM | No Comments
Did you know that 84 year-old Jimmy Carter works out every single day?  

Someone with discipline like that could become President of the United States.

Vitamin D

By Christen Cunningham on May 18, 2009 2:46 PM | No Comments
In a new study in the The Archives of Internal Medicine, researchers looked at the associtation between vitamin D and one fractures.  The study found that consuming vitamin D in doses significantly higher than the RDA reduced the risk for fracturing a bone in the elderly.  

In another study in Medicine and Science in Sports and Exercise that came out this month, researchers found vitamin D levels correlated with high athletic performance.   Peak performance in the study was associated with the study cohort's high relative vitamin D levels.  

According to the Vitamin D Council (can you believe one exists?), you should take 2000 IUs of vitamin D3 in supplement form for four months then get tested for vitamin D, making sure that you are prescribed the "25 (OH) D" test. Your title of vitamin D should be above 50 ng/ml (125 nmol/L).   It is worth noting that the current recommended daily allowance is 200-600 IUs.  Obviously, some doctors - and certainly many fitness professionals - disagree.  But you have to include this in your calculus.

You can also get vitamin D from sunlight but obviously you also get skin cancer from sunlight so there has to be a careful balance.  

Take Vitamin C and Get Fat? Huh?

By Christen Cunningham on May 14, 2009 10:57 AM | No Comments
If you exercise to lose weight and prevent diabetes, avoid Vitamin C and Vitamin E.  

Huh?  You take supplements of these vitamins?  Me too. But the New York Times reports these are the findings of a new study that will appear in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a heavy hitter medical journal.  

I don't know what to make of one study.  But the notion that these vitamins could be counterproductive is just plain stunning to me. Andrew Shao from the Council for Responsible Nutrition has a quote in the Times.  He is from a trade association that makes dietary supplements so take what he says with a grain of salt.  But I agree with his advice: "I wouldn't change recommendations for anyone based on one study," he said. "This is one small piece of the puzzle."

Virtual Colonoscopy: The Future?

By Christen Cunningham on May 13, 2009 9:36 PM | No Comments

At a certain age (we are not giving medical advice here), doctors suggest patients get a colonscopy.  There are now virtual colonoscopies (CT colonography) where a detailed picture of the colon is created by an X-ray machine linked to a computer.  It is much less invasive than a regular colonoscopy which typically requires sedation while a doctor examines the colon through an inserted scope and camera.

The governement does not think the virtual colonoscopies are ready for prime time.  Medicare and Medicaid's decided not to pay for this less invasive colon exam In a memo posted on its Web site Tuesday, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) said, "We have determined that there is insufficient evidence on the test characteristics and performance of screening CT colonography in Medicare-aged individuals, and that the evidence is not sufficient to conclude that screening CT colonography improves health benefits for asymptomatic, average-risk Medicare beneficiaries."

I know a long time member at Club One Fitness that just got a colonoscopy.  Anything less invasive has to be a good thing. This news does not mean that a virtual colonoscopy is not efficacious.  It means the governement is not ready to start paying from them yet.   Wherever you stand on where the virtual colonscopy today, it can only get more useful from here and it is exciting technology.

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