Increasing Physical Activity

1. Increasing Physical Activity T. B. Summer 2004 HSCI 586 Dr. Alemi

2. What happened to my routine? • Previous routine of 45 minutes of aerobic exercise at least 5 times per week maintained for 10 years! • Habit of formal exercise faded away when: • Enrolled in graduate studies Fall 2002. • Job responsibilities lead to increased hours spent at work.

3. A look at then….. Daily Routine • A lot of control over evening hours • Usually spent only 8 hours at work • Regular exercise was more easily accomplished Weekly routines

4. A look at now….. Daily Routine • Increased hours spent at work leaves less available hours in evening • Most free hours are spent doing school work • Leaving early from work for school on Wed leads to using personal time to finish work projects at home Weekly routines

5. Conclusions • Motivation or the desire to exercise is the same now as it was then • What changed was my environment: • More time spent at work • Time demands of graduate program • Time spent in class • Time spent doing assignments • Less available time to exercise

6. Reasons to change • Health benefits of regular exercise: • Reduces risk of developing heart disease • Lowers blood pressure • Reduces risk for diabetes • Reduces risk for osteoporosis • Reduces risk for colon and breast cancer • Improves mood and mental functioning • Maintains healthy weight • Personal reasons: • To maintain muscle mass and build physical endurance despite challenges of the normal aging process.

7. I need some help! • Solicited a colleague at work to be involved in my quest for personal improvement (process owner), to assist me to: • Define my goals for increasing physical activity. • Streamline work processes to decrease time spent at work. • Identify opportunities in daily schedule to incorporate increased physical activity. • Support and celebrate my successes.

8. How much physical activity? • Time constraints call for flexibility in methods used to improve physical fitness. • Exclusive reliance in the past on aerobic exercise to meet exercise needs may not be successful with today’s schedule. • With process owner: • Research physical benefits of exercise and determine desired level of physical activity. • Define goals for physical activity.

9. Goals for Increasing Physical Activity • Successful Increase in Physical Activity will be measured by: • Meet daily goal: • Aerobic exercise of at least 30 minutes per day, or • Accumulate at least 8500 steps using a pedometer • Meet weekly goal: • Aerobic exercise of at least 1 ½ hours per week • The term “exercise” is used to describe either goals for aerobic exercise or steps taken.

10. What changes can I make? • Wear pedometer daily to assess goal of 8500 steps (or 4 miles). • Move office from 3rd Floor to 12th Floor. • Take the stairs instead of the elevator. • Arrive at work 30 minutes earlier (before clinic operations begin) to accomplish tasks/projects without interruptions. • Leave work at 5 PM (1 hour earlier), unless work is required to meet imminent deadline.

11. Method • Measure baseline or pre-implementation data for 1 week • Implement proposed changes for following 3 weeks. • Post weekly results to storyboard and display on office wall.

12. Results: Control Chart for Duration of Missed Exercise

13. Goal for Weekly Aerobic Exercise

14. Conclusions • Performance improvement processes can be used successfully to facilitate lifestyle changes. • Time-between control charts are very useful in evaluating the success of systemic changes on patterns of an exercise program.

15. Plans to maintain the gain • Continue to monitor daily exercise for 3 months (“refreezing” of systemic change). • Re-evaluate goals for exercise September 30 • Consider setting the bar higher! • Revisit exercise program when finished with graduate program at the end of the year.