Doctor’s POV : Learning from my patient’s health mistakes

An advantage of being a health care provider is being a first-hand witness to other people’s general health mistakes in life. Here are some common health mistakes in my patients I often see and strive to avoid myself:

1. Not Protecting Muscle Mass 💪🏽 & Function: I see too many patients admitted after avoidable falls with injuries and too many who end up in nursing homes even after a minor illness. Muscle mass begins to decline with age starting mid-30s (called Sarcopenia). Our muscle tone & strength make us feel that ‘energy’. They are designed to move, so ignoring moving deteriorates muscle mass and tone faster, which means easier fatigue and easier loss of balance. We don’t need to be body-builders but even a few minutes of strength training & regular brisk walking a day have proven benefits in reducing dementia and fall risk, keeping body inflammation levels low & improving bone density, and cardiovascular health. Studies show how regular working out improves our skin, longevity, balance, and also tolerance & side-effect risks from chemotherapy. It’s worth the daily small efforts to preserve our independence & life satisfaction in the golden years. An easy way to start is the 7-minute daily workout!
   
   💡 Our Muscles are an important anti-aging organ, this fountain of youth can be turned on anytime! Never late (Yes – for women too)!
   
   
2. Not Protecting Hearing 👂🏽: Loud sounds are all around us – concerts, loud TV & radio, traffic, driving, construction, etc . We may not always think of them as noise but the damage occurs nevertheless & accumulates over time. The threshold of hearing damage for our ears is surprisingly low. As info on this link shows, more than 15 minutes of continuous use of a typical lawn mower or more than 2 minutes of power-tools is damaging to hearing. Hearing loss is tied to dementia (part of the brain that processes hearing will shrink if not used as much) and hospital delirium. Loud sounds can also precipitate vertigo attacks in some. A patient with hearing loss is also at risk for suboptimal healthcare since they may not fully understand what providers tell them but also feel embarrassed to ask to repeat what was said. So it may be worth being mindful of them and keeping some comfortable ear-plugs handy to protect your hearing. One of my favorite phone apps is Sound Meter which shows sound decibels in real time.
   
   
3. Not Protecting the Back: A chain is only as strong as its weakest link. Bad posture, especially while picking things off the floor, weight gain, soft mattresses, and being sedentary with a bad posture elevate the risk of back pain and one can easily end up paying for it with a lifetime of pain issues. Chronic back pain affects mood, mobility & capacity for exercise. Add protecting back health to the list of things I wish kids are taught early in school. It’s especially worth it to learn the right technique to lift heavy and light objects from the ground
   
   
4. Not Building & Protecting a Social Circle 👯‍♀️: The happiest patients I see are the ones who are busy on their phones chatting with friends and family and those who have regular visitors. Even when faced with serious health issues, such patients seem to handle it better with emotional and social support. As this Harvard page states, “Loneliness has an equivalent risk factor to health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day, shortening one’s lifespan by eight years.”
   
   
5. Not Carrying a Fall alert Device ⌚: Fall risk goes up for humans after 70 years of age and increases every year thereafter. We get numerous admissions where an elderly person just lay helpless on their house floor after a fall for days since they could not move themselves to call for help from weakness or fracture. Some of them even have a Life-Alert device at home but simply forget to or don’t like wearing them. Timely help makes a huge difference before dehydration, renal failure & infections set in. Much better and wearable Fall alert devices now exist, and for those who can afford one, there is of course the Apple watch with the advantage of EKG detection. For anyone with a history of falls or risk of falls, I now strongly advise having a fall alert device on.
   

You got any more? Feel free to comment….