Again, parenting tips for fellow parents. Please watch the hours your child spends in front of television. British study published in the journal Thorax, shows that children who watch tv for more than 2 hours a day double their risk of developing asthma.
The study suggests the link between breathing patterns and sedentary behaviour, resulting in developmental changes in the lungs and wheezing illnesses in children.
If your children do suffer from asthma, allow them to swim more. Swimming is a particularly good form of exercise for children with asthma as it is less likely to trigger asthma symptoms than other forms of exercise. In fact, regular swimming can increase the volume of the lungs and help develop good breathing techniques.
--------------
For reference
Journal Thorax : http://thorax.bmj.com/
Showing posts with label exercise. Show all posts
Showing posts with label exercise. Show all posts
Monday, March 9, 2009
Monday, December 29, 2008
Exercise Ball for Late Pregnancy Workout
If you are in your third trimester of pregnancy, and considering what exercise you should do as your bump and weight are getting heavier, you may want to get on the ball.Exercise ball is indeed an effective tool for strengthening your core abdominal muscles during pregnancy. Exercising using ball also provide you with relaxation and physical relief during pregnancy and labour.
There are some tips and guidelines you should follow when purchasing exercise ball.
- Make sure the ball is made of high quality burst-resistant material
- Inflate the ball according to your height
- If your height is less than 5 feet 3 inches (160 cm), inflate the ball to 55 centimeters
- If you are taller than 5 feet 3 inches (160 cm), inflate to 65 centimeters
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Bad Breath
Need to take mints right after your each meal to help cover your bad breath? Familiar? If yes, please make sure you avoid taking in sugary mints, as it will only help with the bad breath temporarily, and next thing you know the bad breath is getting even worse.The term for bad breath is halitosis. The smell is from substances called volatile sulphur compounds caused by the breakdown of protein in the mouth by bacteria. When breaking down the protein, bacteria produce compounds which have aromas characteristics of rotten eggs, cabbage, sulphur, gasoline, mothballs, faeces, corpses, urine, decaying flesh, sweat, rancid-cheese, and off-milk.
The bad breath also occur in the morning when we wake up, or after we finish exercise. The underlying reason is that when we sleep and/or exercise (dehydrate), the flow of saliva diminishes, and thus less flushing of food by saliva. This causes the food to stay longer in our mouth to be broken down by the bacteria.
Another cause of halitosis is poor oral hygiene, such as gingivitis and periodontitis. When foods are gathered in damaged gums and teeth, the bacteria have plenty of time to break down the foods.
Less common cause of halitosis include infections such as bronchitis, post nasal drip, or sinus infection; chronic conditions such as diabetes, kidney or liver failure, reflux oesophagitis (when oesophagus is inflamed by acidic food entering from stomach).
Smoking can cause bad breath, since it cause mouth to dry and possible gum disease.
Foods such as onions and garlic can give bad aroma, however the smell would not last long.
So save yourself from embarassment. Make sure you do one or more of the following:
- Brush teeth after meal. You can use mouthwash if you prefer, however brushing is more effective
- Floss your teeth after each meal
- Brush back of your tongue or scrape with a tongue scraper
- Take sugarless sweets to help stimulate saliva production
- Drink plenty of water (the easiest way for us working people!)
Friday, April 11, 2008
Should You Exercise If You Have Back Pain
I have a prolonged and luckily quite mild backpain (unbelievable, I said lucky!). The back pain has been ongoing for quite a while, every day, for the last 4 months. I do not dare to hit the gym as usually I always go for treadmill, and treadmill only. It ain't good for back pain because running causing more strain put on our back. And so, I haven't been exercising at all since I first experience the back pain. However, after reading one of the article about exercise after backpain, it really change my opinion on not taking exercise at all.
Maybe some of you also experience backpain. Most of my friends do. Back pain can easily be caused by as simple as not sitting in the right position for a period of time. Some people will only experience back pain for several days, and then the pain will pass. Some of us, including myself, will still in strife few weeks or months down the road. What important is to avoid the back pain becoming long term.
An Australian trial looked at the role of general exercise supervised by a physiotherapist and advice aimed at a steady return to regular activities and found that they both made a significant difference to pain reduction compared to routine care. The exercises were aimed at fitness and increasing tone rather than focussed on the back specifically.
It's being increasingly recognised that the stability of the back is more than just having strong abdominal or back muscles and that being active has all sorts of benefits including improving your state of mind.
Australian physiotherapists have also pioneered techniques for strengthening what are called your core muscles. These are the ones along the inside of your spine and can be helped by using biofeedback to become more aware of them.
You can also find helf from experienced back physios for this core strengthening.
For Reference
Title: Annals of Internal Medicine
Author: Liset HM et al. Physiotherapist directed exercise, advice or both for sub-acute low back pain.
URL: http://www.annals.org/2007;146:787-796
Maybe some of you also experience backpain. Most of my friends do. Back pain can easily be caused by as simple as not sitting in the right position for a period of time. Some people will only experience back pain for several days, and then the pain will pass. Some of us, including myself, will still in strife few weeks or months down the road. What important is to avoid the back pain becoming long term.
An Australian trial looked at the role of general exercise supervised by a physiotherapist and advice aimed at a steady return to regular activities and found that they both made a significant difference to pain reduction compared to routine care. The exercises were aimed at fitness and increasing tone rather than focussed on the back specifically.
It's being increasingly recognised that the stability of the back is more than just having strong abdominal or back muscles and that being active has all sorts of benefits including improving your state of mind.
Australian physiotherapists have also pioneered techniques for strengthening what are called your core muscles. These are the ones along the inside of your spine and can be helped by using biofeedback to become more aware of them.
You can also find helf from experienced back physios for this core strengthening.
For Reference
Title: Annals of Internal Medicine
Author: Liset HM et al. Physiotherapist directed exercise, advice or both for sub-acute low back pain.
URL: http://www.annals.org/2007;146:787-796
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Bottom Line of What Works to Lose Weight
The following guidelines of which works better, to help you lose weight more effectively (^-^)
Diet vs Exercise
The common question is, which will work, diet or exercise? The answer is both.
If you hate exercise and want to lose weight just by changing your diet, you're setting yourself up to fail, says Dr Chris Tzar, an exercise physiologist from the University of New South Wales. Choose this path and there's a 90% chance you'll regain any lost weight within three years, he says.
That's because dieting without exercise increases the odds you'll lose muscle from your body along with any fat. Since muscle cells burn more energy than fat cells, even when you're not actually doing anything, losing muscle makes it harder to lose weight and keep it off. That's why so-called resistance training, which builds muscle strength, is recommended, along with more aerobic exercise such as walking, swimming or running.
In addition, more muscles increase metabolism. So even when you are sleeping, you can still burn calories!
In contrary, if you love eating yummy foods and cannot change your diet, and you prefer to exercise instead, what you can do is to look at how much exercise it takes to burn off a single slice of apple pie (two hours walking) to realise that for most people, losing anything more than a few kilos through exercise alone will be challenging. It's unlikely you'll be able to work out enough to make up for any significant amounts of eating (let alone past amounts of eating). And like exercise, a good diet makes you healthier on the inside too.
Bottom line: Keep your food intake in check and exercise on regular basis.
Fat Burning Exercises
Okay. Now you hit the gym to start exercising. But which exercise is more effective in helping you to lose weight?
"Is walking more fat-burning than jogging? Well, if you walk for three hours it might be more fat burning than jogging for 15 minutes. One of the most important factors…is whether people are going to sustain the activity long-term" to quote Dr Tzar.
He recommends people try a range of different activities: to find out what they like, to help prevent boredom, and to reduce injuries.
What about those diagrams on exercise machines that suggest the body's 'fat burning zone' occurs at a low level of exertion? Unfortunately these are very misleading.
The body burns three types of fuel, i.e. fats, carbohydrates and protein. As exercise intensity increases, the proportion of the fuel mix coming from fat decreases, however the absolute amount of fat burned remains fairly stable, Tzar says: "It may be a smaller percentage but of a larger quantity."
To maximise your fat burning, high-intensity exercise is almost certainly the better option. In other words, ignore the diagrams and don't restrict your exertion because you think it somehow means you'll burn more fat.
Bottom line: Find one exercise activity that you like, that you can do at greatest intensity for a sustained period of time, is the best way to lose weight.
Best Time of Day to Exercise
Technically, the body's preference for burning fat is slightly higher first thing in the day. However, early morning exercise maybe harder for us to do, because we are generally less alert, our body temperature is low, and joints are stiffer.
Bottom line: The best time of day to exercise is the time of day that allows you keep doing it, preferably on a regular basis.
Counting Kilojoules?
Counting Kilojoules on food that you consume can be quite depressing and time consuming, especially for us who is busy at work.
Many experts also feel it's unnecessary and possibly psychologically unhealthy to count Kilojoules. Even WeightWatchers recently moved to offer an alternative 'no count' weight loss plan for those put off by the prospect of weighing foods and keeping records.
Chris Tzar agrees, "The reality is, if you're having a diet adequate in fibre, low in glycaemic index [that is, the carbohydrates are the type that break down slowly], and you're minimising your saturated fats, it's highly unlikely you're going to be overdosing on calories."
Bottom Line: Following the general principles would be sufficient. You do not have to feel obliged to count the Kilojoules.
How Often to Weigh
One study found that people who concentrated on being healthy, by improving food choices and getting more exercise, weighed less after 12 months than another group who thought more about weight.
Daily weighing is unnecessary at all. The weight loss you see on the scale may not be loss of fat, but most probably is simply loss of water in your body. And sometimes, you may not see any weight loss at all. This is because weight loss isn't linear. It could range from a quarter of a kilo to a kilo per week.
Bottom Line: If you would like to keep track of your weight loss from day to day, you may want to weight on daily basis. However, if you are easily discouraged, weekly or monthly weighing might be better than doing it on daily basis.
Diet vs Exercise
The common question is, which will work, diet or exercise? The answer is both.
If you hate exercise and want to lose weight just by changing your diet, you're setting yourself up to fail, says Dr Chris Tzar, an exercise physiologist from the University of New South Wales. Choose this path and there's a 90% chance you'll regain any lost weight within three years, he says.
That's because dieting without exercise increases the odds you'll lose muscle from your body along with any fat. Since muscle cells burn more energy than fat cells, even when you're not actually doing anything, losing muscle makes it harder to lose weight and keep it off. That's why so-called resistance training, which builds muscle strength, is recommended, along with more aerobic exercise such as walking, swimming or running.
In addition, more muscles increase metabolism. So even when you are sleeping, you can still burn calories!
In contrary, if you love eating yummy foods and cannot change your diet, and you prefer to exercise instead, what you can do is to look at how much exercise it takes to burn off a single slice of apple pie (two hours walking) to realise that for most people, losing anything more than a few kilos through exercise alone will be challenging. It's unlikely you'll be able to work out enough to make up for any significant amounts of eating (let alone past amounts of eating). And like exercise, a good diet makes you healthier on the inside too.
Bottom line: Keep your food intake in check and exercise on regular basis.
Fat Burning Exercises
Okay. Now you hit the gym to start exercising. But which exercise is more effective in helping you to lose weight?
"Is walking more fat-burning than jogging? Well, if you walk for three hours it might be more fat burning than jogging for 15 minutes. One of the most important factors…is whether people are going to sustain the activity long-term" to quote Dr Tzar.
He recommends people try a range of different activities: to find out what they like, to help prevent boredom, and to reduce injuries.
What about those diagrams on exercise machines that suggest the body's 'fat burning zone' occurs at a low level of exertion? Unfortunately these are very misleading.
The body burns three types of fuel, i.e. fats, carbohydrates and protein. As exercise intensity increases, the proportion of the fuel mix coming from fat decreases, however the absolute amount of fat burned remains fairly stable, Tzar says: "It may be a smaller percentage but of a larger quantity."
To maximise your fat burning, high-intensity exercise is almost certainly the better option. In other words, ignore the diagrams and don't restrict your exertion because you think it somehow means you'll burn more fat.
Bottom line: Find one exercise activity that you like, that you can do at greatest intensity for a sustained period of time, is the best way to lose weight.
Best Time of Day to Exercise
Technically, the body's preference for burning fat is slightly higher first thing in the day. However, early morning exercise maybe harder for us to do, because we are generally less alert, our body temperature is low, and joints are stiffer.
Bottom line: The best time of day to exercise is the time of day that allows you keep doing it, preferably on a regular basis.
Counting Kilojoules?
Counting Kilojoules on food that you consume can be quite depressing and time consuming, especially for us who is busy at work.
Many experts also feel it's unnecessary and possibly psychologically unhealthy to count Kilojoules. Even WeightWatchers recently moved to offer an alternative 'no count' weight loss plan for those put off by the prospect of weighing foods and keeping records.
Chris Tzar agrees, "The reality is, if you're having a diet adequate in fibre, low in glycaemic index [that is, the carbohydrates are the type that break down slowly], and you're minimising your saturated fats, it's highly unlikely you're going to be overdosing on calories."
Bottom Line: Following the general principles would be sufficient. You do not have to feel obliged to count the Kilojoules.
How Often to Weigh
One study found that people who concentrated on being healthy, by improving food choices and getting more exercise, weighed less after 12 months than another group who thought more about weight.
Daily weighing is unnecessary at all. The weight loss you see on the scale may not be loss of fat, but most probably is simply loss of water in your body. And sometimes, you may not see any weight loss at all. This is because weight loss isn't linear. It could range from a quarter of a kilo to a kilo per week.
Bottom Line: If you would like to keep track of your weight loss from day to day, you may want to weight on daily basis. However, if you are easily discouraged, weekly or monthly weighing might be better than doing it on daily basis.
How to Lose Weight, and How to Maintain is The Hardest Part
I believe many of us do experience this so-called yo-yo diet. Sometimes we lose weights, we get happy, allow ourselves some snacks and yummy guilty foods to celebrate our 'achievements', and before we know it, the fat is back on!!!
Of course those with very very strong willpower and self control can manage to keep the fat off for a long period of time. But not everyone of us is very strong willed. At times, we will fall down to the "pampering" ourselves with good food.
Not that good food is bad. What you can do is eat in moderate amount, spread your food intake into many times a day, 5 times a day will be enough to keep you feeling full, and avoid hunger which can lead you to eat excessively at once. Regular exercise will keep you in the right track.
But willpower and self control tend to fail. The question is, how to keep yourself in check.
There is a US trial involving over a thousand people started with a six-month weight loss program, during which they lost an average of 8.5 kg.
After this they were randomly allocated to 1 of 3 groups for 2 and 1/2 years: doing things for themselves with some written advice; a web-based interactive program which got them to feed in their weight and activity levels and encouraged increased exercise and sensible eating behaviours; and finally, a third group was allocated to monthly personal contact from a trained person, both by phone and face to face.
The good news was that everyone weighed less than they did at the start. The bad news was that it wasn't the intial 8.5 kilos.
Almost everyone regained weight, but those who'd had personal contact put less back on than the others, to the tune of about 1.5 kg.
The web-based program looked good to begin with, but soon lost its effect.
It's not cheap, but it looks as though to slow the passage of food from hand to mouth, what you need is having someone on your back.
Of course those with very very strong willpower and self control can manage to keep the fat off for a long period of time. But not everyone of us is very strong willed. At times, we will fall down to the "pampering" ourselves with good food.
Not that good food is bad. What you can do is eat in moderate amount, spread your food intake into many times a day, 5 times a day will be enough to keep you feeling full, and avoid hunger which can lead you to eat excessively at once. Regular exercise will keep you in the right track.
But willpower and self control tend to fail. The question is, how to keep yourself in check.
There is a US trial involving over a thousand people started with a six-month weight loss program, during which they lost an average of 8.5 kg.
After this they were randomly allocated to 1 of 3 groups for 2 and 1/2 years: doing things for themselves with some written advice; a web-based interactive program which got them to feed in their weight and activity levels and encouraged increased exercise and sensible eating behaviours; and finally, a third group was allocated to monthly personal contact from a trained person, both by phone and face to face.
The good news was that everyone weighed less than they did at the start. The bad news was that it wasn't the intial 8.5 kilos.
Almost everyone regained weight, but those who'd had personal contact put less back on than the others, to the tune of about 1.5 kg.
The web-based program looked good to begin with, but soon lost its effect.
It's not cheap, but it looks as though to slow the passage of food from hand to mouth, what you need is having someone on your back.
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