June 3, 2003 [Volume 4, Issue 12]
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In this issue of To Your Health:
Physical Education Gets an "F"
With
obesity and diabetes rates in American children on the rise, parents are
more concerned than ever about their children's fitness levels. Poor habits
in children can lead to the development of chronic diseases in adulthood;
children active in sports or other physical activities are also less likely
to engage in risky behaviors. Current recommendations are for children
to perform at least an hour of physical activity every day, and that at
least 50% of physical education (PE) classes consist of moderate-to-vigorous
activity.
To evaluate the activity levels of third-graders in PE classes, more than 800 kids from a wide range of socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds at hundreds of elementary schools across the U.S. were individually observed for one day. Researchers recorded the amount of PE class time children spent sitting, standing, walking, performing vigorous exercise, etc., and how many PE classes the school mandated children take each week.
On average, the 9-year-olds only took two PE classes per week, instead of the recommended five; only 6% of these children had PE every weekday. While in PE class, the third-graders averaged merely five minutes of vigorous activity and 12 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity per session (25 minutes per week) - far short of the recommended levels.
Make sure your child isn't sitting through physical education hour. If he or she is not getting enough exercise at school, encourage physical activities at home. Learning sports and being active at a young age allows kids to develop coordination, muscle and skeletal strength, and good life habits, and best of all - to have fun!
Reference: The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development Study of Early Child Care and Youth Development Network. Frequency and intensity of activity of third-grade children in physical education. Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine 2003:157(2), pp. 185-190.
For more information about pediatric issues, go to https://www.chiroweb.com/find/archives/pediatrics.
Not a Drop!
Alcohol use during pregnancy increases an infant's risk for premature birth and physical or mental retardation; at higher alcohol levels, fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS) and even death may occur. In spite of growing public awareness about the harmful effects of drinking alcohol while pregnant, the number of expectant mothers who continue to drink may actually be rising.
Most previous studies on alcohol use during pregnancy have drawn data from high-risk, low-income clinics. However, a recent study on alcohol use during pregnancy analyzed over 1,100 pregnant women (18 years or older) from a wide variety of obstetrics clinics in Michigan. Participants completed brief questionnaires while waiting for prenatal care.
Alcohol use during pregnancy was reported by 15% of the women. The majority of these women reported very little alcohol consumption (over 85% claimed only one drink or less per week) - yet 6% of the women reported binge drinking during pregnancy, or having at least five drinks on one occasion while pregnant. These women were more likely to smoke and to be in the early stages of their pregnancy than other participants. Surprisingly, over half of the women who admitted drinking during pregnancy said their health care provider had talked to them about alcohol use during pregnancy.
Women in this study from Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research may have been more honest than they would have been with their health care provider, since they were informed the results of this study would remain confidential. These statistics are frightening. If you are pregnant, don't drink even a single drop of alcohol during pregnancy, and don't hesitate to inform others of the dangers, either - many women are simply unaware of the risks of a drink or two. If you need help confronting the issue (or confronting someone else), don't be afraid to speak to your doctor.
Reference: Flynn HA, Marcus SM, et al. Rates and correlates of alcohol use among pregnant women in obstetrics clinics. Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research 2003:27(1), pp. 81-87.
For more information on prenatal health, head to https://www.chiroweb.com/find/archives/women.
Unsafe Supplements
An estimated 29,000 dietary supplements are available in the United States. These supplements include all ingested health products (botanical, nonbotanical, herbal or traditional cultural remedies in pill or other forms) and are usually intended for maintaining health, rather than treating existing conditions (as most pharmaceutical drugs do). Many of these supplements may produce adverse events: unwanted side-effects that cause injury or illness. Dietary supplements do not have to endure the same mandatory registration or safety testing as prescription drugs, and adverse events related to them are difficult to monitor.
In a study in The Lancet, 11 poison control centers recorded details about approximately 1,500 telephone calls related to dietary supplements (or over 60% of all calls), nearly 800 of which involved symptoms. Through a review process, approximately 500 of these reports were analyzed based on evidence that the adverse events were related to dietary supplements. People taking supplements named reasons including disease treatment (over one-quarter of callers); anxiety prevention; cognitive or athletic performance enhancement; sleep or stress aid; or boosting of the immune system.
One-third of adverse events from supplement use were considered moderately severe or worse, including symptoms such as heart attack, seizures, coma, liver failure and death. Ingredients most frequently associated with adverse events were the botanicals ma huang, ginseng, guarana and St. John's wort, and the substances zinc, melatonin and chromium. The more ingredients being taken, the more severe the symptoms, and about half of calls were related to more than one ingredient taken. Most of the supplements did not appear in the database used by the poison control centers.
This study raises a few points. Most importantly, be careful when considering any supplement not regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and take it only after talking to your doctor and researching it on your own. Don't take multiple supplements together or with medications, or negative reactions may occur. Also, as this study showed, the longer you take a supplement, the more concentrated it may become, and the more likely it will be to cause an adverse reaction.
Reference: Palmer ME, Haller C, et al. Adverse events associated with dietary supplements: An observational study. The Lancet 2003:361, pp. 101-106.
To browse more studies on consumer safety, check out https://www.chiroweb.com/find/archives/general/consumer/index.html.
Be Low-Fat and Fit
Adult physical activity levels remain low, even as obesity rates continue to soar. Both of these factors lead to an increased risk for many forms of cancer later in life. Exactly how does each of these traits affect risk for cancer deaths?
Researchers recently evaluated the effects of cardiorespiratory fitness and obesity on all forms of cancer for approximately 5,500 men and women. In the study, appearing in Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise, cardiorespiratory fitness (based on heart rate produced during a treadmill test) and body mass index (or BMI, calculated from weight and height measurements) were recorded between 1972-1976; participants were followed until 1998 to determine cancer deaths.
Men who had the best cardiovascular fitness based on treadmill tests were 53% less likely to die from cancer than the least-fit men, while obese women with the highest BMI were 1.5 times more likely to die from some form of cancer than other women. Body weight had no effect on cancer risk in men, however, and fitness did not significantly affect women's risk for cancer.
Men with low fitness levels and obese women may have significantly increased risks for multiple forms of cancer. Nonetheless, both men and women should maintain a healthy body weight and cardiovascular fitness, as many studies have shown the benefits of each for either gender. Your chiropractor can help you put together the best fitness program to meet your individual needs.
Reference: Evenson KR, Stevens J, et al. The effect of cardiorespiratory fitness and obesity on cancer mortality in women and men. Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise 2003:35(2), pp. 270-277.
Sports and fitness information abounds at https://www.chiroweb.com/find/archives/sports.
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