Clash of the Industries

I had a brief debate with one of the Fit Fuel advisors this past weekend about the future of our business and where the biggest opportunities lie in health. Although money is less of a motivator to me now than it ever was (only to the extent that it allows me freedom to do what I want to do, and it frees up time), I expressed my belief that within the next 50 years, the richest man in the world will be someone involved in biotech, either in medical uses for nanotechnology or genetics. If you’ve seen the movie ‘I, Robot’, you can imagine the scale on which companies who can harness a new breed of technology can operate. The power is almost scary. People worry about Google, but Google’s encylopedia of desires only tells Google what you already know; the guys who map your genome or decode your brain’s cerebral cortex know what nobody else knows because this type of data can’t be aggregated with a web crawling bot.

We’re going to clone humans – it’s only a matter of time before some guy who’s been locked in a lab for the past 20 years fails to resist the temptation to create life (I linked to that blog b/c the guy’s profile quote is ‘A molecule is not a vector…and it never will be’, and i thought that was the most awesome quote i’ve ever heard). He’s in horrible shape, four white walls have made him delirious and he likely hasn’t been laid in a while. As more and more people experiment with stem cells and gain a better understanding of the genomes of humans and related species, there are going to be breakthroughs on an unimaginable scale. A cure for cancer or a vaccination for HIV are the tip of the iceberg. Advances in these fields are going to fundamentally change the landscape of healthcare both for practitioners and patients. Poor nations will have more effective methods of treatment and rich nations will yield tools that fuel advances in drugs, artificial intelligence, nutrition, and a plethora of other segments of the health market. This is what gets me excited, this is what keeps me coming into work busting my ass everyday. It’s the next step, the big breakthrough that I know is going to come from young, ambitious minds meeting, collaborating and thinking big beyond our wildest dreams. I’m not interested in selling you a bottle of ALRI Venom Hyperdrive so you can slave away on a treadmill in a dark corner of your gym in an attempt to lose your spare tire.

Online retail has boundaries, but we’re building the framework and network for something much, much bigger. When people ask us about the REAL vision of our company, we talk almost as much about offline things as we do online.

It will be interesting to see how the war between privately funded research and public or government funded research plays out – think Celera vs. the government in the Human Genome Project. Decoding the human genome was easy; commercialization of new technologies will be the hard part. So we’ve got all of this raw data – what to do with it? How should we interpret it? What can we use it to produce? Can we gain patents on those uses and how viable is the business model for a company that chooses to market these new commercialized technologies? Most important, who really owns this stuff anyway? After all, the genome is in the public domain. Celera threw in the towel and donated all of their research to the database when they realized they did not have a viable economic model because no drug company would pay for access to their genome data if it would be available to the public a few months later as was mandated by the federal government. Industries will spring up out of nowhere – genomics consulting, manufacturing of new technologies, a broadening of the doctors specializing in gene therapy. Old industries will expand – everything from finance (VC’s have to fund this stuff, afterall) and intellectual property lawyers will have a field day, but an interesting one to say the least.

Self-Belief Makes Weight Loss Possible

If you are what you eat, what you eat has a lot to do with how you think about yourself, says a QUT PhD researcher whose study is part of an international research project on the healthy ageing of women.

Queensland University of Technology nursing researcher Rhonda Anderson said self-efficacy had emerged as a strong influence on women’s decision to do more exercise or eat more healthily.

She surveyed more than 560 South-East Queensland women aged between 51 and 66 on their exercise and diet habits and found that although women in their 50s were keen to make healthier diet and exercise changes, they had few effective strategies to draw upon.

“This is an age when women’s weight tends to peak, and almost two-thirds of the survey group were overweight or obese,” Ms Anderson said.

“Self efficacy is our belief that we can produce the result we want to produce, so a person with high dietary self-efficacy believes they can eat healthily no matter what - even when bored, upset, tired, on holiday or at a party.

“A person’s level of self-efficacy determines how hard they try and how long they stick at things in the face of difficulties. People with high self-efficacy are motivated and optimistic - when the going gets tough, they keep going.

“People with low self-efficacy avoid difficult tasks and when things get tough they are more likely to give up. We can improve our self-efficacy by developing skills, having role models and getting encouragement from others.”

Ms Anderson’s study found being overweight or obese was a key influence on self-efficacy. “Women who carried a lot of excess weight were more likely to have low self-efficacy and to not believe they could stick to an effective healthy exercise or diet program,” she said.

“Education is also a factor - women with a tertiary education were more likely to have high self-efficacy for exercise.”

Ms Anderson said her findings were timely given the population was ageing and women lived longer than men.

“We are going to have a lot of older women and if they are obese at age 60 they are not well placed to have a healthy old age. Carrying excess weight has been linked to diseases including diabetes, heart disease and breast cancer,” she said.

Ms Anderson said that most of the women in her study who had made an effort to exercise more took up walking and those who had tried to eat more healthily had mainly cut down on fat.

“But going for a stroll and not having butter on your bread won’t have you lose 30kg. Women need specific education and support to be successful in improving their health and losing weight.

“We need to reach the many women juggling work and motherhood and feel guilty if they take time for themselves.

“A lot of women in their 50s are keen to improve their health, and we need to take advantage of that, but if we can support them in taking care of themselves from an earlier age, so much the better.”

Laughter Yoga Is New Wellness Trend

“Ho ho, ha ha ha,” students in a fitness class at the University of Michigan Health System chant repeatedly while clapping their hands and walking around the room.

They’re just getting warmed up; in the next half-hour, they will stretch their muscles and work on breathing exercises. They’ll also laugh for most of the 30 minutes, from self-conscious giggles to uninhibited belly laughs. All in the name of fitness.

This is a “laughter yoga” course, part of a growing trend in parts of the United States, India and other countries. The students are re-learning something children already know instinctively: that laughter makes you feel better.

“Kids laugh about 400 times a day, and adults only about 15,” notes Barb Fisher, a certified laughter yoga leader and the instructor of this class offered by the U-M Health System’s MFit health promotion division. “Laughter is a gift that has been given to us to make us feel better.”

Fisher teaches her students that not only is it fun to laugh, but that laughter yoga (also known as hasya yoga) can provide many health benefits:

* Help to reduce stress
* Enhance the immune system
* Strengthen cardiovascular functions
* Oxygenate the body by boosting the respiratory system
* Improve circulation
* Tone muscles
* Help with digestion and constipation

Even with all of these health benefits, though, laughter yoga shouldn’t replace other types of aerobic and weight-bearing exercises.

“Studies have shown that 20 seconds of a good, hard belly laugh is worth three minutes on the rowing machine,” Fisher says. “However, that does not mean we want to stop doing all other exercises. It means that incorporating laughter yoga can add to the benefits we see from our regular exercise routine.”

Like more traditional fitness classes, laughter yoga requires a warm-up period. Since students can’t necessarily start a class prepared to break out into deep laughter, they begin with the clapping and chanting mentioned above. Then they perform breathing exercises, followed by stretches and laughing games.

As developed by laughter yoga creator Madan Kataria, a family physician from India,

these laughing exercises can include many varieties, such as:

* Hearty laughter: Laughter by raising both the arms in the sky with the head tilted a little backwards.
* Greeting laughter: Joining both the hands and shaking hands with at least four or five people in the group.
* Appreciation laughter: Join your pointing finger with the thumb to make a small circle while making gestures as if you are appreciating your group members and laughing simultaneously.
* Milk shake laughter: Hold and mix two imaginary glasses of milk or coffee and pour the milk from one glass into the other by chanting “Aeee….,” and then pour it back into the first glass by chanting “Aeee…” Then, everyone laughs while making a gesture as if they are drinking milk.

The students in Fisher’s class have discovered the mental and physical benefits of these and other laughter exercises.

“The biggest effect that I’ve gotten from laughter yoga is what it’s done for me mentally, and that it has lightened up my day and my week,” says Deborah Slosberg. “I also think it has improved my breathing.”

“It gives me a relaxed feeling, and yet I actually feel like I worked out,” says Ann Twork. “You get back some of the child in you.”

Active Lifestyle Is A Natural Pain Reliever

It may seem counterintuitive to exercise when suffering with joint pain, but physical activity is actually a natural pain reliever for most people suffering from arthritis. A recent study published in Arthritis Care and Research journal concluded that regular exercise, specifically the Arthritis Foundation Exercise Program, is an effective course in significantly improving and managing arthritis pain. This is good news for the aging population of U.S. baby boomers who want to get back to basics with a natural remedy for pain. In fact, arthritis is projected to increase by 40 percent, affecting 67 million Americans, in the next two decades.
The in-depth study looked at the effectiveness of the Arthritis Foundation Exercise Program, developed in 1987 to reduce pain and stiffness by keeping joints flexible and muscles strong. Key findings of the study include participants reporting a decrease in pain and fatigue, an increase in upper and lower extremity function, and an increase in strength after participating in the basic, eight-week exercise program. Also, participants who continued the exercise program independently, beyond eight weeks, sustained improvement in reduced stiffness.

“The study showed that the exercise program is suitable for every fitness level, even inactive older individuals,” said author of the study Leigh Callahan, Ph.D., Thurston Arthritis Research Center, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. “Many people believe the myth that exercise exacerbates their symptoms. The truth revealed in the study is that symptoms improved with exercise.”

Exercising for joint health is different than exercising for cardio health. People living with arthritis don’t have to sweat to achieve success. The basic eight-week Arthritis Foundation Exercise Program consists of low-impact routines with gentle range-of-motion movements that can be done while sitting or standing.

“Even minor lifestyle changes like taking a 10-minute walk three times a day can reduce the impact of arthritis on a person’s daily activities and help to prevent developing more painful arthritis,” explains Patience White, M.D., chief public health officer of the Arthritis Foundation. “Physical activity can actually reduce pain naturally and decrease dependence on pain medications.”

About the Study

The objective of the study was to evaluate the basic eight-week Arthritis Foundation Exercise Program for improvements in symptoms, functioning, level of physical activity and psychosocial outcomes. A total of 346 individuals with self-reported arthritis from 18 sites participated in a randomized controlled trial. The eight-week exercise program consisted of exercise twice weekly for one hour. The study participants had a mean age of 70 years (ranging from 32 to 94 years old), 90 percent were female, 75 percent were white and 60 percent had more than a high school degree.

Adjusting Body Image Ideals Reduces Eating Disorders AND Obesity

Oregon Research Institute scientist Eric Stice, Ph.D. and his colleagues have found that their obesity prevention program reduced the risk for onset of eating disorders by 61 percent and obesity by 55 percent in young women. These effects continued for as long as 3 years after the program ended. In their research on eating disorders, Oregon Research Institute (ORI) scientists help young women reduce the influence of the “thin ideal,” which is described as associating success and happiness with being thin.

These results are noteworthy because, to date, the idea that we can reduce risk for future onset of eating disorders and obesity has been an unrealized goal: over 80 prevention programs have been evaluated, but no previous program had been found to significantly reduce risk for onset of these serious health problems.

Stice notes that, “One reason these programs might be more effective is that they require youth to take a more healthy perspective, which leads them to internalize the more healthy attitudes. In addition, these programs have simple take-home messages, which may be easier to remember in the future than messages from more complex prevention programs.”

Funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Stice has been studying eating disorders for 18 years. He has conducted this line of research at Stanford University and the University of Texas, and now continues at the Oregon Research Institute in Eugene, Oregon. He is presently funded by NIH to conduct two research studies to further test these programs with young women in Eugene/Springfield.

The obesity prevention program, called Healthy Weight, helps adolescents adopt a healthier lifestyle, wherein they gradually reduce intake of the least healthy portion of their diet and increase physical activity. This program simply teaches youth to balance their energy intake with their energy needs, and to do so on a permanent basis, rather than on the transient basis which is more typical of diets. College-age women in Eugene/Springfield are participating in this study.

The eating disorder prevention program, called the Body Project, consists of four one-hour weekly sessions in which participants critique the thin ideal espoused for women in our culture and learn how to challenge current and future pressures to be thin. The program has also produced reductions in other important outcomes such as body dissatisfaction and eating disorder symptoms. Stice has partnered with area high schools on this study and has trained high school counselors to facilitate the weekly sessions.

“It is our hope that other institutions and communities will adopt this program for delivery in their schools,” notes Stice; “If this program is delivered to enough youth, it should be possible to reduce the prevalence of these serious health problems.”

Given that eating disorders are one of the most common problems faced by young women and that obesity is presently credited with 111,000 deaths per year in the US, it is vital to develop brief prevention programs for these pernicious conditions. At least seven other institutions have begun delivering these interventions in the US and in other countries.

Results of this study are published in the April issue of the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology.

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