Tag: exercise

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Exercise Recommendations for Patients with Diabetes

Why is Exercise Important in Patients with Diabetes?

Exercise is a very important part of getting blood sugars under control and one that is often overlooked, put aside or not done at all.

The American Diabetes Association exercise recommendations are:

  • For most adults with type 1 and type 2 diabetes: 150 or more minutes per week of moderate-to-vigorous activity over at least 3 days per week with no more than 2 consecutive days without exercise.
  • Shorter durations (minimum 75 min/week) of vigorous-intensity or interval training may be sufficient for younger and more physically fit individuals.
  • Adults with type 1 and type 2 diabetes should perform resistance training in 2-3 sessions/week on nonconsecutive days.

What if You Don’t Exercise but Want to Start?

For those who do not exercise at all but want to start, it is important to start slowly and safe. It is always a good idea to check with your doctor before starting any exercise routine.

It is important to start by being more active, slowly adding exercise like walking. The key is to be less sedentary and start moving more.

Start by Moving More

Research found that sitting too much for long periods of time is harmful to our health especially related to heart health, mental health and increased risk for becoming disabled.

Just getting up once every 30 minutes to stretch or walk around the house or workplace is better than sitting for hours. Take every opportunity you can to get up and move.

If you don’t exercise at all, getting motivated is half the battle. Once you start being more active, you’ll find that it isn’t as hard to keep going — you’ll feel better and have more energy.

Aerobic exercise, strength training, flexibility exercises/stretching, balance exercises, and activity throughout the day are the types of activities recommend for people with diabetes.

Exercise should be part of your Diabetes Action Plan and you can make it one of your Health goals.

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Healthy Habits

You have decided to become healthier, but big changes make you anxious?

Not sure where to start, do I have to exercise 5 to 7 days right from the start? I’m a big proponent of making small changes, keeping those changes to a small number like 1 to 2 goals at a time. Depending on what areas, you think you need to improve, you can choose from the following list to get started:

Self-Care:

• Practicing stress reduction or deep breathing
• laughing or socializing
• using mindfulness or meditation
• attending a financial wellness seminar

Rest & Recover:

• Stretching
• taking a yoga class
• getting 7-9 hours of sleep
• taking time for yourself
• getting a chair massage (self-massage counts, too!).

Movement:

• Taking the stairs instead of the elevator
• going for a walk
• biking or walking to work
• taking an onsite yoga class
• running a race
• going to the gym

Nutrition:

• Eating a fruit or vegetable

• drinking water

• bringing lunch from home

• sharing a healthy snack with coworkers

Small changes will add up and make a big difference to your health. Changing your habits is a process that involves several stages. Sometimes it takes a while before changes become new habits. Healthier habits may protect you from serious health problems like high blood pressure or diabetes. If you continue these habits for a while, they may become part of your daily routine.

The four stages of changing a health behavior are:

• contemplation
• preparation
• action
• maintenance

If you started to make some changes, it is a good idea to set health goals. Review what worked, what didn’t work, and can you make changes to make sure you can accomplish that goal. Measuring progress is important to make sure your changes are yielding the results you wanted.
Changes are hard but small changes or steps can help overcome the anxiety that comes with big changes. Keeping motivated can also be a barrier, change your routine and reward yourself whenever you reach a goal. Healthy Habits become even more important for patients with chronic disease like hypertension and diabetes.

Patients with chronic disease states like hypertension or diabetes, should consult with your Primary Care Doctor before starting any kind of exercise program. More information can be found online at the American Diabetes Association for patients with diabetes or Pre-diabetes. Certified Diabetes Educators can help patients with diabetes get blood sugars under control, set health goals and develop a diabetes plan. For patients with chronic disease Ambulatory Care Pharmacist and Community Pharmacist are a great resource to help you get your health to goal.

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Even a little bit of movement matters

The take-home message from a mountain of data is that less sitting and more exercise is the goal, and even a little bit of improvement helps. For those who have a desk job, taking short movement breaks throughout the day is protective.

Scientific evidence strongly suggests that the more time a person spends sitting, the higher their risk of death from any cause. Multiple large studies and high-quality data analyses show that regardless of age or health issues, the hours we spend in our office chairs, cars, or on the sofa watching television can literally kill us.

A well-conducted study published in July 2016 in The Lancet looked at a massive amount of data from 16 large studies and including over a million subjects. What they found was that 60 to 75 minutes of moderate physical activity (The CDC has published a table describing many activities ) like walking to work, walking the dog, riding a stationary bike, line dancing, golf or softball, doubles tennis, or coaching sports eliminates the risk of death related to sitting, even from sitting for more than eight hours per day.

Can’t get in an hour of these types of activities per day? Just 25 minutes of moderate activity is somewhat protective, even for people who sit for eight or more hours per day. Other studies have suggested that exercise can be broken up and spread out throughout the day and still be beneficial. One study found that even hourly breaks of light activity decreased measurable damage to our arteries.

Time spent sitting was analyzed separately from time spent sitting and watching television. TV time is associated with even greater risk of death, and exercise was not as protective. Even more than an hour per day of moderate activity did not eliminate the risks associated with five or more hours per day of zoning in front of the tube. Why the extra negative effect of TV watching? The authors hypothesize that people are more likely to get up and walk around at work than they are while watching TV. In addition, people tend to watch TV in the evening after eating dinner, which may have negative effects on our blood sugars and fat metabolism. Or, perhaps people are prompted to snack on unhealthy foods during those commercials breaks. Watching large number of hours of television? Consider an exercise bike or a treadmill, place it in front of the screen.

Whether it’s sitting in an office chair or watching TV, those who get less than five minutes of moderate activity per day fare the worst, and the longer they sit, the higher their risk of death from any cause – be it heart disease or cancer.

For more information see: exercise recommendations for patients with diabetes.

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Setting Health Goals

We all set goals for work, for education, for careers and for life in general. What about setting goals for your health? How many times have you wanted to diet, exercise only to say “I will do it tomorrow, I will start my diet tomorrow or I will start exercise tomorrow”.  For patients with chronic diseases such as diabetes, high blood pressure, cholesterol, COPD, etc. postponing those goals can bring bad consequences.

Setting goals is the start of the road to better health. Do you keep your promises? Goals are a type of promise that you make to yourself. Honor your commitments, especially those made to yourself.  For each goals, smaller steps can be set so as not to get over whelmed.  Set SMART goals:

S: Specific

Be specific, don’t just say I will exercise starting tomorrow. State how much and what types of exercise you will do. Example: I will start exercising tomorrow, I will start walking 30 minutes three days per week on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays in the morning.

M:Measurable

Have a way to measure your progress. if you are trying to loose weight for example; weigh your self daily or at the end of every week.  If you are going to start walking measure how far you walk for 30 minutes or how fast.

A:Attainable

Your goals should be meaningful to you, they  should specific to you and they should be goals that you really want to achieve.

R:Realistic

Your goals should not be impossible but goals you will be able to work toward.  Loosing 20 lbs in one month is probably not realistic. Create a plan and commit to it.

T:Time sensitive

Set a time in which you will accomplish your goals. Saying “I will work three times a week for 30 minutes” is good but not as good as saying “I will walk three times a week for 30 minutes per week and will walk 3 miles in 30 minutes by the end of three months”.

Writing down your goals, making a very specific plan and sharing it with friends or love ones can increase the odds that you will stick to your goals. Commit to your self and improve your health today.