OPHEA/PARC webinar - "A Beginners Guide to Aging Successfully: Move It or Lose It!"
Posted Le 28 novembre 2016
As we all know, there is an international aging population trend. People are living longer, sometimes as much as 30 years longer, because of increased Quality of Life knowledge and Active healthy Aging. In the webinar, conducted by OPHEA/PARC on November 24th,2016, called “A Beginners Guide to Aging Successfully: Move it or Lose it!”, the topic of physical activity being crucial for an exceptional Quality of Life (QoL) was discussed.
Dr. Stuart Philips, the webinar presenter, uses the W.H.O definition of Active Aging, “Active Ageing is the process of optimizing opportunities for health, participation and security in order to enhance quality of life as people age … The word “active” refers to continuing participation in social, economic, cultural, spiritual and civic affairs, not just the ability to be physically active or to participate in the labour force”. (http://www.who.int/ageing/active_ageing/en/) He uses this quote in association with a discussion about Health Related Quality of Life (HRQL). HRQL are all of the risk factors that face an aging population of Canadians, such as Employment, Obesity, Alcohol use etc. that may lead to a poor QoL caused by chronic disease and related conditions in old age. But there is one treatment that could lower the risk factors – PHYSICAL ACTIVITY. Dr. Philips simply defines Physical Activity as, “Movement of the body by skeleton muscles that result in energy being expended”. He doesn’t want physical exercise to be scary, but seem easy. Furthermore, in this webinar, Dr. Philips explains how Physical Activity can offset the indicators of Cancer, Heart Disease, Diabetes and Dementia. The common side effect that physical activity can act against, in all of these chronic diseases, is Scarcopenia. In brief, Dr. Philips describes scarcopenia as a “progressive neuromuscular syndrome … that leads to the inability to perform activates of daily living”. And EXERCISE, particularly resistance training exercise, can increase muscle strength and decrease mortality rates in the leading chronic diseases and conditions, and ward off scarcopenia. In short, the stronger you are (by age 60), the higher your mortality rate later in life!
Dr. Philips remarks that Falls are one of the major results of a lack of strength and balance in older adults, possibly due to one of the aforementioned chronic diseases or scarcopenia. The exercise he recommends to combat these factors is Yoga. He uses several studies to demonstrate the effect yoga exercise has on balance and mobility, to battle against the effect of falls. (At the end of the webinar, in a Q & A session, I asked Dr. Philips what would be the best exercises for fall prevention – here, he also stated that beyond his belief in yoga, he also recommended strength exercises that promote strength around the ankles, balance exercises and learning how to navigate around obstacles).
To conclude the presentation, Dr. Philips wants his audience to know that there are no risks to physical exercise; long held misconceptions of pain and discomfort are a myth. He provides several ways that people can incorporate physical activity into their everyday lives – find an activity you like, make physical activity time social time, walk wherever and whenever you can, take the stairs, carry your groceries – every little bit helps. The benefits outweigh the risks, you have nothing to lose and more to gain!
*To view the presentation/webinar slides, use: https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&ik=d81a670ac4&view=att&th=158976207df364ca&attid=0.1&disp=safe&zw
*A blog recap and recording of the webinar will be available within the next month through PARConnects.
*To learn more about OPHEA/PARC, please visit: http://parc.ophea.net
*OPHEA/PARC provides an activity poster for adults 65 years and older at: http://parc.ophea.net/resource/older-adults-physical-activity-guidelines-poster-ages 65-and-older