Ninety-one-year-old Robert Scambler describes himself as a very happy person. He has a good circle of friends, he loves his assisted-care living facility in Tsawwassen and he keeps active. He’s only got one complaint. “My leg problem,” Scamber sighs, in his still-strong Scottish accent. “If I didn’t have this leg problem I’d be out playing golf right now!” The Edinburgh-born Scambler’s leg problems are more than an inconvenience. They could have resulted in amputation.
If you’re healthy and mobile, it’s easy to take for granted the simple, everyday act of sitting up in bed. However, for an immobile person bound to a hospital bed, being sat upright via a bed adjustment can result in pressure and pain.
Many people know all too well the difficulty of getting motivated to exercise. It’s not easy. Transitioning from being sedentary to exercising regularly can feel like an uphill battle, but getting started is important. A growing mountain of evidence shows that regular exercise can drastically improve a person’s well-being and prevent major health problems later in life. And it’s never too late to get moving and reap the health rewards, says Dr.
British Columbia’s Lower Mainland is a veritable outdoor playground for weekend warriors like 55-year-old runner Sibeal Foyle. However, as the West Vancouver resident discovered, despite being invigorating, routine physical activity can also cause physical pain. Foyle had been experiencing noticeable discomfort in her Achilles tendon on and off for a few years, but while she was training for the 2011 Vancouver marathon, she was completing an 18-mile training run and had to stop because the pain in both of her Achilles became unbearable.
Studies touting the ills of living a sedentary lifestyle have been numerous in recent years, but few have grabbed headlines quite like one recently published in The Lancet that found that sitting for eight hours a day or more could increase a person’s risk of premature death by up to 60 percent.
While getting physically slower in later years is simply a part of getting older, a new study led by Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute (VCHRI) scientist Dr. John Best spotlights how a significant decrease in gait speed is a possible predictor of future cognitive decline among older adults.
In 2013, the small Vancouver Island seaside municipality of Sidney drafted a resolution to regulate the use of three- and four-wheeled motorized scooters because of the safety risks they were posing to pedestrians, traffic, and the scooter operators themselves. Regulation was seen as an opportunity to mandate operation and safety training for the motorized mobility devices. Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute (VCHRI) scientist Dr. Ben Mortenson is currently conducting a scooter training and education feasibility study, in part because of such community-identified safety issues.
Prescribing a wheelchair – a life-altering piece of health equipment – to a patient without follow-up to check comfort and proper use happens far too often and is a disservice to society, says Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute scientist Dr. Bill Miller.
