Sea Crest Health Care Center

According to Jarett Berry, a cardiologist at University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, one must be vigilant about keeping physically active. Yes, in what they used to call “Middle Age.”  Wasn’t that the time we thought would be a little slower, a tad less “vigorous,” an entitlement to ease up a bit? Not if you want to hit 85 says the good Dr. “If you are fit in mid-life, you double your chance of surviving to 85.”

Dr. Berry’s findings, presented last week in San Francisco at the American Heart Association’s Annual Epidemiology and Prevention Conference, are based on an analysis of 1,765 men and women who had physical examinations performed during the 1970’s and 1980’s at the Cooper Institute, the Dallas-based birthplace of the aerobics movement. Put another way: If you’re not fit in your 50’s, your projected life span “is eight years shorter than if you are fit,” Dr. Berry says.

So regular exercise is the most cogent weapon we have to ward off illness and fight disease- as it results in lower blood pressure, healthier cholesterol, and lower blood sugar.

Rest assured… there is a silver lining to all this before you start jogging, digging ditches, or playing singles tennis:  Studies also indicate that exercise’s greatest impact occurs when individuals move from a sedentary lifestyle to embarking on regular moderate exercise regimens.

That’s encouraging. You go, Girl!

By Ruth Folger Weiss

A few months after undergoing routine hip replacements, a number of patients of  a well known LA orthopedic surgeon started suffering from excruciating pains. The surgeon, Dr. Lawrence Dorr, was stymied until he discovered one factor they all had in common; the same replacement joint, manufactured by Zimmer Holdings, was implanted in all of them. Several needed to have their replacement replaced in another bout of surgery. When Zimmer was first contacted about this problem, they just brushed it off. It took a year of more complaints and pressure from doctors until they pulled this device off the market. In the interim many more patients unknowingly had their joints replaced with a faulty Zimmer “Durom Cup” with crippling results.

This upsetting scenario could have been avoided, and many patients could have been spared the agony, if the U.S. would have a Joint Registry in place. A Joint Registry is a national database that tracks the well being of patients with artificial hips and knees. Countries such as Australia, Britain, Norway and Sweden have such a system in place and the benefits are numerous. Tracking the success rates of the different joints available results in the faulty ones being pulled from the market much quicker. The registry data puts pressure on manufacturers to explain why their products perform poorly and the registry alerts surgeon to stop using flawed joints.

Monitoring devices like artificial joints supposedly falls under the domain of the The Food and Drug Administration but they are often overwhelmed by the vast number of products it monitors and because doctors often do not report problems.

Nearly one million hips and knees were replaced in the U.S. alone last year, about half of the world’s total. As the world’s leader in joint replacement, the U.S. should take the initiative and be the leader in follow-up too.  So far all efforts to establish a database here have failed due to the many hurdles, financial and practical, of our fragmented and decentralized health care system, as well as a lack of support from Medicare.

By Ruth Folger Weiss

I’m going out to have a good time and incorporate some exercise while I’m at it.
I decided it was time to leave the desk after reading the latest studies on how crucial exercising (alright, particularly in midlife) is in warding off dementia and Alzheimer’s disease decades later.
In a study of more than 1,400 adults involved in the “Cardiovascular Risk Factors, Aging, and Incidence of Dementia ” (CAIDE) project, which involved 1,449 men and women in Finland, those who were physically active in their free time during middle age were 52% less likely to develop dementia 21 years later than their sedentary counterparts. Their chance of developing Alzheimer’s disease was slashed even more, by 62%, and even stronger in those carrying the ApoE e4 gene, which is associated with a higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease.

“Free Time” is the definitive term here; exercise done as occupational activity, such as heavy lifting, didn’t have the same protective effect as leisure-time exercise have the same effect.

Suvi Rovio, MSc, a researcher at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, concurs. “By being physically active in midlife, people who carry the ApoE e4 gene can lower their risk of Alzheimer’s to the same level as someone not carrying the gene.”

But Maria Carrillo, PhD, director of medical scientific relations at the Alzheimer’s Association, says that physical exercise “does not have to be strenuous or even require a major time commitment. It is most effective when done regularly, and in combination with a brain-healthy diet, mental activity, and social interaction.

“We know that physical exercise is essential for maintaining good blood flow to the brain as well as to encourage the development of new brain cells. “It also can significantly reduce the risk of heart attack, stroke, and diabetes, and thereby protect against those risk factors for Alzheimer’s and other dementias.”