Health and Wellness 101 To Live Your Best Life

If given the chance to teach a college course, I’d opt to talk about the basics of wellness. Although I’m not a professor, I can as a family physician share the basics. With lifestyle changes, diet and exercise, you can start living your best life. Whether your wellness visit with your doctor is around the corner or down the road, your health is a yearlong effort. Follow this “online course,” and you will be ready for your next PCP visit. You may just give yourself an A.

Prevention

You should see your primary care doctor each year for your wellness exam, even when you’re feeling well. Your PCP will perform tests, screenings and immunizations that help prevent, slow and stop some diseases. That way, we can determine if there is something you are missing. You maintain your home and car, which are replaceable, but there is only one of you. You are your greatest asset.

There are three types of treatment:

1. Prevention is when you do things to keep disease from happening, including:
• Altering risky behaviors, such as poor eating habits and tobacco use
• Eating more fruits and vegetables
• Exercising regularly
• Stopping drug and alcohol use
• Getting vaccinations
2. Detection is when you have a disease but don’t know it. It could be you have high cholesterol or blood pressure. You could have undiagnosed cancer or diabetes. Screenings such as mammograms and regular blood pressure checks are vital. They help detect disease early when treatment is more effective.
3. Intervention is when we manage existing medical conditions. This includes slowing or stopping the disease from advancing with chemotherapy or rehabilitation.

Keep Your Heart Healthy

There are some risk factors for heart disease you cannot control. These risk factors include your age, family history and gender. There are other risk factors you can control, including:

• High blood pressure
• High cholesterol
• Obesity
• Smoking
• Diabetes

The more risk factors you have, the greater degree of your risk for heart disease. You can change your risk through:

• Blood pressure control (normal blood pressure =120/80)
• Cholesterol control
• Exercise
• Managing your diabetes
• Smoking cessation
• Weight control

Get Your Cholesterol Checked

During your visit, your doctor will follow your cholesterol through your screenings. Calculate your risk through an online risk estimator. Enter your lipid results, and the tool will give you your risk score for over 10 years.

A Calcium Scoring Cardio Scan is a painless way to determine plaque buildup in your heart that can lead to chest pain or a heart attack. This 15-minute exam can often detect the early signs of heart disease before you have symptoms. Early treatment can reduce or eliminate the calcium. Plus, it’s affordable at $50.

Manage Your Weight

Maintaining your wellness must also include maintaining your weight. Determining if you are obese involves knowing your body mass index. The National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute has a handy calculator to get your BMI. Here are the recommendations:

Part and parcel to weight management is to know your calorie budget. Generally, a person’s calorie budget is 1,800-2,200 calories a day. A pound is 3,500 calories, so if you cut 1,000 calories out of your diet each day, that would be a 2-pound weight loss each week.

Exercise

If you sit too much, you start to lose muscle mass and bone density. You cannot maintain or help reduce that loss without putting energy into your system. This is done through exercise. At a minimum, try to get at least 150 minutes of exercise each week for basic, optimal health, but frequency of exercise is important. You can break that time up throughout the day.

Beyond lowering your risk of obesity and diabetes, exercise improves your:

• Cardiac strength
• Energy
• Immune system
• Mood
• Physical fitness
• Sleep

When you exercise:

• Start low and go slow.
• Listen to your body. If it hurts, don’t push through it.
• Take warm-up and cool-down periods.
• Include strengthening, stretching and mobility exercises
• Strive for five days per week, but get in at least three days per week.

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Michael Crim

Dr. Crim is a family physician with Meritas Health Briarcliff. He earned his medical degree from A.T. Still University’s Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine. He completed his residency in family medicine at Southern Illinois University.