Fast Fitness - Exercise Involvement In World Health

Here is Friday Fast Fitness - shed unhealthy petty feelings of maltreatment because you had to wait in line for your luxury items, or didn't get them in your color.

1. We have things to be extremely grateful for.
2. More of the time, it is not necessary to gain them through harming others or the Earth.
3. Lead by example. Teach children and others not to litter, pollute, harm others, do harm for money, do harm for power, harm themselves.

Check Simple Ways to Get Started:

• My Academy- the Academy of Functional Exercise Medicine (AFEM) teaches people and communities how to be healthy in body and actions. Readers who use my work have been teaching their groups simple healthy bending and movement for daily life instead of injury producing habits, good food instead of disease causing food, healthy training for high level athletics and military, healthier medical practices for sick, injured, preventive medicine, "green" fitness, and healthier mindset. Come join us by doing simple things in your home and community - click AFEM.

Fitness Fixer Examples:

• Human Rights Day Dec 10
• Fast Fitness - Strengthen Character
• Fast Fitness - Open Your Eyes and World View
• Fast Fitness - Quick Refreshed Perspective Every Day
• Fast Fitness - Pro-Social Behavior Improves Health of All
• Fast Fitness - Recycling and the Movie "Garbage Dreams"
• Equinox - An Exercise in Treating People With Equality
• Grate Christmas
• Fast Fitness Friday - Strong Spirit
• Fitness Is Getting Out And Living

Labels: fast fitness, military fitness, mind, spirit

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Fast Fitness - Third Group Functional Training Exercise: Ankles and Knees in Jumps and Landings

Here is Fast Friday Fitness - third in the series of Functional Fitness Training (FFT) to teach your teams, squads, classes, students, kids, groups, battalions, etc.

Assemble your group in neat rows. Stand in front in view of all. Tell them this is a basic, functional physical skill to reduce musculoskeletal injuries, that puts together the first and second skills, previously learned:

1. Tell everyone to crouch using good bending (knees do not sway inward or slide forward, taught in the first skill), then rise to toes with stable neutral ankle (not bowing outward at the side, taught in the second skill).
2. Next, have everyone bend and rise increasingly rapidly and smoothly, in a jumping motion, first without rising from the ground, then barely jumping. With each bend and rise, they maintain good knee bending and neutral ankle. Repeat 10-100 times, depending on time and needs.
3. Next, tell everyone to jump, landing softly using thigh and hip muscles for shock absorption, and good knee bending and neutral ankle. Start jumping moderately, then work for increasing height with each repetition. Repeat 10-100 times, depending on time and needs.

Use conscious control to prevent inversion sprains and turns by not allowing the ankle to invert (turn sideways) when rising to toe during push-off in running and jumping, and coming down during landings. Watch for healthy ankle and knee stability and placement throughout the team season.

Each new Functional Training exercise shows how to teach your groups (or self) how to prevent common musculoskeletal problems during the team season or operational theater. Learn this one to be ready for an upcoming FFT, needed for cutting, changing direction, lateral movement, more.

Trainers, Drill Instructors, readers, send in your stories of how you use these in your program.

Functional Group Trainings:

• Info on this new Functional Training program - Back to School With Fitness Fixer
• Fast Fitness - The First Group Functional Training Exercise, Good Bending for Back and Knees
• Fast Fitness - Second Group Functional Training Exercise: Ankle Stability and Ability
• Fast Fitness - Third Group Functional Training Exercise: Ankles and Knees in Jumps and Landings
  

Related Fitness Fixer:

• Fast Fitness - Develop Ankle Stability Sense While Stretching
• Bending Right is Fitness as a Lifestyle
• How To Treat Ankle Sprains and Prevent Them
• No More Ankle Sprains Part II
• Which Shoes Help Exercise, Fall Prevention, and Ankles?

Random Unrelated Fitness Fixer:

• What Does It Look Like to Not Use Abdominal Muscles?

Labels: ankle, fast fitness, International Academy of Functional Sports Medicine, jumping, knee, leg strength, military fitness, sprain

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Thank You LaikaSpoetnik Grand Rounds From The Netherlands

Thank you Jacqueline for hosting Grand Rounds Vol. 6 No. 2 this week on the LaikaSpoetnik MedLibLog and including my article Fast Fitness - Stretch For Menstrual Cramps - a quick stretching technique to ease symptoms of menstrual and other uterine cramps. On the web, Grand Rounds is a collection of the best on-line medical posts from the week. Who Is Laika?

Jacqueline is an information specialist in the Netherlands. She chose the blog name "LaikaSpoetnik" as a pseudonym because she thought of starting her blog as "a kind of an pioneering experiment." Laika is a Russian word for someone who howls or barks. The first dog to orbit the earth was renamed Laika (originally Kudryavka- "Little one with curly hair" and other names). Laika, pictured at right, flew in Spoetnik II (Dutch spelling of 'Sputnik'). Laika died soon after launch, in 1957.

Laika was not the first astro-dog. Several flew previous suborbital missions for the Soviet Union. In 1961, Nikita Khrushchev gave one of the puppies of Soviet space dog Strelka ("arrow") to Caroline Kennedy, young daughter of then U.S. President John F. Kennedy. That doggie had a cold war romance with a Kennedy dog. More puppies.

A different Grand Rounds host works hard each week to find and list the articles. This is different from the Grand Rounds in a hospital, which is a lecture for doctors about a patient or topic. Jacqueline went to much extra work for this Grand Rounds. I thank her. Here is her photo of the results:

Related:

• Space Walks
• Altitude Sickness on Flights
• Indiana Jones Rocket Sled

Labels: aerospace, Grand Rounds, military fitness

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Fast Fitness - Second Group Functional Training Exercise: Ankle Stability and Ability

Here is Fast Friday Fitness - the second of the promised series of Functional Fitness Training (call it FFT until we create a better name) that you can teach your teams, squads, classes, students, kids, groups, battalions, etc.

Assemble your group in neat rows. Footwear is whatever used for their sport or activity. Stand in front facing forward. Everyone sees your feet and you see each participant's feet. Tell them this Functional Fitness Training exercise is a basic, needed many dozens of times every day, for their sport or activity, and for daily life - ankle stability when rising to toes, stepping down, landing from jumps, running, turning skills, and other motions requiring ankle stability:

1. Tell everyone to stand straight and lift heels to stand on the ball of the feet
2. Tell everyone to look down at their own feet. Weight should not shift outward/sideways over the small toes. While everyone holds tip-toe, make sure each participant straightens ankles, shifting weight back over the big and second toe. Prevent teetering and turning outward.
3. Have everyone stand flat again, then rise to toes again, this time properly without needing to adjust ankles. They should feel the difference - using leg and ankle muscles instead of letting body weight slide sideways, which bends ankles into classic sprain position - turned at the outside (inversion).

Repeat good toe-rising 10 times or any number that suits your group's need - more for groups needing higher training (or groups with poorer memory), faster for teams requiring this skill done quickly in actual use, and so on. Tell everyone they will need this for skill #3 - for stepping down and landing from jumps. This is scheduled for Fast Fitness Next week.

Watch them for good ankle stability practices throughout the team season. Reduce ankle injury from letting the ankle invert (turn sideways). Instead use muscles and conscious control to prevent inversion sprains and turns, and get leg, foot, and ankle exercise, from the many needed neutral-ankle stability needed for varies movements daily.

Each new Functional Training exercise will show you how to teach your groups (or self) how to prevent common musculo-skeletal issues during the team season or operational theater.

Send in your ideas for a name for this program. Trainers, Drill Instructors, send in your stories of how you use them in your program.

Functional Group Trainings:

• Here is the post explaining this new program - Back to School With Fitness Fixer
• Fast Fitness - The First Group Functional Training Exercise, Good Bending for Back and Knees
• Fast Fitness - Second Group Functional Training Exercise: Ankle Stability and Ability
• Fast Fitness - Third Group Functional Training Exercise: Ankles and Knees in Jumps and Landings
  

Related Fitness Fixer:

• Fast Fitness - Develop Ankle Stability Sense While Stretching
• Fast Fitness - Make Your Own Balance, Agility, and Leg and Ankle Retrainer
• Fast Fitness - Strength, Abs, Balance, and Ankle and Leg Stabilization
• How To Treat Ankle Sprains and Prevent Them
• No More Ankle Sprains Part II
• Which Shoes Help Exercise, Fall Prevention, and Ankles?
• Fast Fitness - Balance and Ankle Stability in the Dark

Unrelated Random Fitness Fixer:

• What Medical Students Told Me About Nutrition

Labels: ankle, fast fitness, International Academy of Functional Sports Medicine, military fitness, sprain

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Fast Fitness - The First Group Functional Training Exercise, Good Bending for Back and Knees

Here is Fast Friday Fitness - the first of the promised series of Functional Fitness Training (call it FFT for now) that you can teach your teams, squads, classes, students, kids, groups, battalions, etc.

Assemble your group in neat rows so you can see each participant, and they feel the self-control of the neat rows. Stand in front facing sideways so everyone can see you in profile view. Tell them that the first Functional Fitness Training exercise is a basic that is needed many dozens of times every day, for their special sport or activity and for daily life - good bending:

1. Tell everyone to keep both heels down on the ground while they bend their knees and crouch about halfway down
2. Tell everyone to look down at their own feet and pull their (bent) knees back until they can see their toes. Tell them if they cannot see their toes because their knees cover their toes, their knees are too far forward (left).
3. Have everyone stand and bend again, this time properly without needing to adjust knees back over feet (right). They should feel the difference - using thigh and hip muscles, instead of sliding weight forward onto the knees.
   

Repeat good bending 10 times or any number that suits your group's need - more for groups needing higher training (or groups with poorer memory), faster for teams requiring this skill done quickly in actual use, and so on. Then put items on the ground they use for their sport or work and use the new good bending to retrieve. Replace on ground with good bending, and retrieve with good bending. Repeat for the number suited for your needs.

Tell everyone that this is how they can bend for picking up all their gear (except medical or tactical reason not to). Watch them for good bending practices throughout the team season. Reduce back injury from bad bending, get leg exercise, burn calories, and build strong bones from the many free built-in squats daily.

Each new Functional Training exercise will show you how to teach your groups (or self) how to prevent common musculoskeletal issues that arise during the team season or operational theater. Send in your ideas for a name for this program. Trainers, send in your stories of how you use them in your program.

Functional Group Trainings:

• Here is the post explaining this new program - Back to School With Fitness Fixer
• Fast Fitness - The First Group Functional Training Exercise, Good Bending for Back and Knees
• Fast Fitness - Second Group Functional Training Exercise: Ankle Stability and Ability
• Fast Fitness - Third Group Functional Training Exercise: Ankles and Knees in Jumps and Landings

Related Fitness Fixer:

• Free Exercise and Free Back and Knee Pain Prevention - Healthy Bending
• How Good Would You Look From 400 Squats a Day - Just Stop Unhealthy Bending
• How Often Should You Be Healthy?

Unrelated Random Fitness Fixer:

• A Little Good Exercise, a Lot of Bad Food - Overweight Still No Mystery

Labels: fast fitness, International Academy of Functional Sports Medicine, military fitness

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How Effective Are Medical Treatments For Back Pain?

Many well-known conventional treatments for injured athletes and military personnel came from ways to keep wounded combatants able to continue fire, not to maximize their long-term survival or later health.

Years of my career laboratory research was improving physical training for athletes and military, and developing injury protocols that were healthy, not just a remedy for the moment. I also found that much good sports medicine for athletic motion was never applied to the more common body motions needed all day. Not only can the athletes benefit, but everyone else. Many patients and readers have success using my improved non-surgical methods, and write us their stories (click for reader stories). Many more have success without writing about it. Other readers asked about various medical (surgical/drug) treatments, and why don't I use them.

Thank you to my colleague Fabrice Czarnecki. M.D. emergency room physician, for sending me a report, recently published in a prestigious medical journal. The work was a systematic review of the "benefits and harms of nonsurgical interventional therapies for low back and radicular pain."

The medical methods they looked at were local injections, botulinum toxin injection, prolotherapy, epidural steroid injection, facet joint injection, therapeutic medial branch block, sacroiliac joint injection, intradiscal steroid injection, chemonucleolysis, radiofrequency denervation, intradiscal electrothermal therapy, percutaneous intradiscal radiofrequency thermocoagulation, Coblation nucleoplasty, and spinal cord stimulation.

Their results: "For sciatica or prolapsed lumbar disc with radiculopathy, we found good evidence that chemonucleolysis is moderately superior to placebo injection but inferior to surgery, and fair evidence that epidural steroid injection is moderately effective for short-term (but not long-term) symptom relief. We found fair evidence that spinal cord stimulation is moderately effective for failed back surgery syndrome with persistent radiculopathy, though device-related complications are common. We found good or fair evidence that prolotherapy, facet joint injection, intradiscal steroid injection, and percutaneous intradiscal radiofrequency thermocoagulation are not effective. Insufficient evidence exists to reliably evaluate other interventional therapies.

What does all that mean? They summed it up in their conclusions: "Few nonsurgical interventional therapies for low back pain have been shown to be effective in randomized, placebo-controlled trials."


Medical reports on these methods (as well as general strengthening exercises) frequently show what is called a scattershot success - meaning if you try it on hundreds of people, it's bound to hit a few of them. Often these hits (moderate improvements) are about the same as chance or as time passing and the person heals on their own over the weeks of the treatment and recovery. Use those medical treatments if you believe in them and prefer them.

I prefer a direct approach:

1. Instead of shots to anesthetize the area, or surgery to remove or fuse an area, retrain movement to be healthy so that you no longer injure the area and it can heal.
2. Instead of medicines to mask the damage you cause, stop the damage.
3. Stopping damage does not mean stopping movement, activity or fun. Use healthy body mechanics to become able to do more than before.

Continue Activities You Love

• Autumn Yard Work - Limiting the Person Instead of the Injury Again?
• When Did Health Become Thinking Out Of The Box?
• Why So Many Aerobics Injuries?
• What is "Fitness as a Lifestyle?"

Notice Damaging Body Mechanics

• Aren't You Supposed To Stick Your Behind Out to Sit Down or Do Squats?
• Prevent Back Surgery
• Sitting Badly Isn't Magically Healthy by Calling It a Hamstring Stretch
• What Does It Look Like to Not Use Abdominal Muscles?
• Simulation Suit To Feel the Pain of Osteoarthritis
• Are You Making Your Exercise Unhealthy?

Fixing Damage Without Surgeries, Injections, or Drugs

• Innovation in Abdominal Muscles
• Surgery for Knee Arthritis, Meniscus, Unnecessary
• Stomach Acid Drugs Increase Osteoporosis and Hip Fractures
• Studies Say Back Surgery Not Needed
• Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) Surgery Unnecessary
• Fix Disc Pain Without Surgery
• FDA Orders Suicide Risk Warning for Common Back Pain and Migraine Drugs, and Others
• Doctor Fakes Benefits in 21 Pain Pill Studies
  
  
  Coming next - Common, Missed Cause of MusculoSkeletal Pain - Your Drugs.
  
  
  
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  Questions come in by hundreds. I make posts from fun mail. Before asking more, see if your answers are already here - click labels under posts, links in posts, archives at right, and the Fitness Fixer Index. Why not try fun stuff, then contribute! Read success stories of these methods and send your own.
  Subscribe to The Fitness Fixer, free. Click "updates via e-mail" (under trumpet) upper right.
  See Dr. Bookspan's Books, take a Class, get certified - DrBookspan.com/Academy.
  

Labels: drugs, fix pain, lower back, military fitness, surgery

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Neutropeptide Y Generation for Healthier Stress Response

Yesterday's article, Extending The Envelope - Military and Civilian, told some of my career work to improve and strengthen human ability. Today, a study from Fort Bragg on Green Berets.

A study of soldiers at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, found that Special Forces soldiers produced more of a molecule called Neuropeptide Y in their blood than regular soldiers. Neuropeptide Y is generated by the body to calm the brain in times of extreme stress.

The Special Forces soldiers mobilized more neuropeptide Y than ordinary soldiers, and were able to sustain it for longer periods. It was concluded that higher levels make them more resilient to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) than the average soldier. Neuropeptide Y returned to normal levels within 24 hours in the Special Forces subjects, but dipped below normal in the control subjects of regular soldiers.

Army Special Forces personnel are also known as Green Berets. It is not known whether the Green Berets' better ability to generate the peptide and endure trauma was something they came in with, which made them more likely to pursue becoming a Green Beret, or had been acquired or enhanced through training. The researchers said, "If we could bottle this, or if we could train people to mobilize their own neuropeptide Y, that would be primary prevention for PTSD - a very exciting approach."

Labels: drugs, military fitness, performance enhancing modality

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Extending The Envelope - Military and Civilian

When I worked as a military research scientist, strong brave men got hazardous duty pay to spend a day with me.

I measured what humans can do, physically and mentally, and how to make them better at it. I tested pilots undergoing acceleration to see what determined susceptibility or resilience to blackouts and other g-force effects. I tested combat swimmers to see what makes them swim faster, farther. I worked on modalities to prevent astronauts' bones from de-mineralizing, because without the pull of gravity, muscles do not make the bones retain calcium. After weeks in space, astronauts return with the equivalent of years of bone loss. I worked on countermeasures. I tested ground troops to see how much they could carry and why.

My work trains the person, making him self-contained and able to withstand harsh conditions without special clothing, tools, or pills. Another department works with garments that help resistance against temperature, weaponry, and other effects. Another group are the 'gadget guys' making yet more things I have to make the guys able to carry around. Another department is pharma-chemicals - what drugs they could develop and administer to block need for sleep and food, heighten focus, or increase strength or speed. Some heart drugs are long-known and used for steadying the marksman's hand by decreasing the contractile pulse of the heart.

Click the labels under this article for more Fitness Fixer on each topic. I have written several posts, with more to come, on my work to "extend the human envelope."

Look for tomorrow's post for one of the things the pharmaceutical groups work on - Neutropeptide Y Generation for Healthier Stress Response.

Labels: aerospace, drugs, g-force, military fitness, performance enhancing modality, stress, swimming, tests of fitness/health

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Weak Hips on Purpose? Running Injury and Hip Strengthening

Who works their hips? Fitness Fixer success story Robert Davis wrote me several

notes that the weightlifters he knew didn't want to exercise their hip because they thought it would take away from the "V shape" they worked for.

Mr. Davis said that using my daily good bending and other functional exercise worked his hip greatly. He was pleased with reduction of stiffness and pain and increase in strength and mobility. No decrease in "V-shape."

The May/June 2009 issue of Sports Health: A Multidisciplinary Approach, published a study based on a literature review, concluding that running injuries to the lower leg may have more to do with weak hip muscles than how many miles run. Lead author Reed Ferber, Assistant Professor and Director of the Running Injury Clinic from the University of Calgary stated ”Hip muscle weakness especially appears to lead to atypical lower extremity mechanics and increases forces on knees and feet while running.” He also stated, "Based on a literature review, it appears that foot pronation (turning the arch and ankle flatter to the ground, and/or the knee inward) and inadequate hip muscle stabilization are the top categories for injury.”

From my own work in this area, I found that strengthening alone won't make you run with good mechanics, prevent pronating, or other injurious habits, you need to retrain them too. Not hard. Stopping your life to do rehab exercises then returning to bad daily movement also isn't so helpful. My work builds-in both strengthening and mechanics to daily life - functional exercise. Robert Davis has been sending in his successes fixing back and other injury using functional fitness.

Robert Davis writes:

"I had made a slight error in my story! I just wanted to let you know.. I had not ordered fix your own pain till only about 4 weeks ago cause I was looking at my expenses and the Amazon one came up!

"So to see how rapidly things change when you take up these habits is even more encouraging.

"Some things I noticed along the way (I did have some slight questions on this!). My hip muscles for one, started to get "sore". I believe this is because of over tightness and overall lack of use. My guess is like every other gym rat they avoid things to make obliques and lower back "too" big because it takes away from the V shape they are after. Everyone seems to fall for this but it is an un-healthy trap I now realize.

"Anyhow I had started to get really sore over the last few weeks in hip muscle areas and even upper buttocks from stretching these areas and working them (using your stuff). When I practiced going into full squats, this really seemed to stretch out areas that began to show signs of weakness/tightness. So it was like working out muscles and getting that "soreness" when your muscles start to adapt. I kinda figure it is as it is just as normal to workout a bicep and for it to "be sore" the next few days.

"The soreness goes away and with each passing week, it becomes more mild - kinda like the body getting used to biceps being sore and you don't get sore anymore.. They do not get sore like they did when I first started your stuff. I was just curious if you had seen this. I am sure it is normal, especially for a group of muscles not used to being used or stretched out.!

"Jeez I do not think most people realize just how tight and weak they can be in areas, mostly because they are never used or people are used to being tight there. People do not believe in the squat (I showed a few people to prove them wrong lol) because they are too tight. I realize how much I am glad I found this out early in life. I get stronger every day in the areas that were weak. I know I will have a much better core, lower back, complete back, and body then before I hurt myself :)

"I put together my "planche/pull up" setup for pictures and to start working on a full planche! That is difficult to do like you do it! Any suggestions? Just keeping trying? Heheh

"Thank you again! Thank you for posting my story."

Mr. Davis, thank you. You are well ahead of the fancy researchers :-)


Strengthen and stretch your hip functionally:

Bending Right is Fitness as a Lifestyle
How Good Would You Look From 400 Squats a Day - Just Stop Unhealthy Bending
Free Exercise and Free Back and Knee Pain Prevention - Healthy Bending
Cardiovascular Cleanup
Fast Fitness - Fix Flat Feet, Pronation, and Fallen Arches
Household Fitness in the New Year

Labels: fix pain, hip strength, hip stretch, knee, military fitness, practice of medicine, pronation, readers inspiring story, running

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Do Military Chants Help Running? - The Jody Calls

When I was in the military, we ran. A lot. Every day. I love to run fast. When we ran, we sang. What did we sing? What they told us to sing - How much we loved to run. How much we loved everything about the military. Why? It kept us from saying what we were thinking. Military cadences have long been used for physical training. These are the Jody Calls.

The origin of the Jody Calls is usually given around World War II, but chanting, sea shanties, group mantras and hymns, and others have been known for centuries. It is generally thought that group unison music reduces perceived exertion, allowing greater effort toward the common goal.

I am a career physiology researcher in extreme environments. That means I spend much time directly testing humans to see what they can do, then how to make them better at it. Doing experimental and research work personally, makes it easier to know if what you hear about fitness is true, or just another of countless repeated myths. Even doctors learn from books that are often not primary sources, just repeated by someone else who learned it in school, repeated from a non-primary source.

In the military, and since then, the Jody Calls interested me. I wanted to know if chanting and singing really make the work of running easier, or just make it seem easier, or perhaps even use more oxygen and is actually more work than running without singing. I did many laboratory experiments on Jody calls.

Some of the experiments I conducted involved running troops on treadmills at different speeds, with specially fitted masks, so that they could chant into the mask, or just breathe regularly for control tests. I collected their expired air (what they breathed out) and analyzed it for oxygen usage and carbon dioxide production, a measure of the work of running. I compared oxygen usage with chanting and without.

Why are U.S. military chants called Jody Calls? There are many stories, usually involving a civilian character named Jody or Jodie, who stayed home when you left… you left… you left… right… left….

Below, hopefully sound file will appear. Turn your computer sound on, and click the arrow to listen to one stereotype call of the U.S. Marine Corps:




More on military cadences, what I found in my experimental work, and perceived exertion to come in future posts.

Posts about Fitness Myths - click Myths.
Related post on Perceived Exertion - Fast Fitness - Figuring Heart Rate Training Range.

Labels: endurance, military fitness, partner exercise, perceived exertion, performance enhancing modality, running, speed, spirit

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Thank You Grand Rounds 5.2 - Medicine and War

Thank You Grand Rounds Vol. 5 No. 2, guest hosted this week by Monash Medical Student.

The theme was posts concerning "Medicine and War."

In a hospital Grand Rounds is a lecture to instruct physicians. On the web, it is a post with a collection of the best medical blog posts of the week. Each week Grand Rounds is hosted by someone who goes to much work to find and create a post listing them.

Thank you Monash Medical Student for doing the hard work of hosting, and for including my post Time of Death From Body Temperature?

Labels: Grand Rounds, military fitness

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Living Under The Sea

Since I was small, I wanted to be a scientist. I wanted to study physiology under the sea. I wanted to live underwater, and for a time, I did. This is how I found out about exploding toilets.

I grew up to be a scientist in extreme physiology - the science of surviving extremes of heat and cold, mountain top and underwater, high and low air and water pressure, exercise and nutritional and pharmacologic tinkering, altitude, g-forces, injury, and other things extreme.

One of the laboratories where I worked was tethered to the bottom of the ocean at a moderate depth. It was a small metal building with air inside. You could not see it from the surface. If you went by in a boat, or drove by the highway, you would see only the sea. We wanted to order a pizza and give the lab address and see the delivery person pull up to nothing but water and try to find us at the bottom of the sea. Even scientists can be funny sometimes.

To live in the lab, we swam down in scuba gear, entered through a small hatch in the bottom, and dried off, or just walked around in a towel. Then we stayed dry while working and sleeping inside. We walked around normally and breathed the air normally, day after day. When it was time to go to work outside in the ocean, we put on scuba gear or surface-supplied hoses, and swam down through the bottom hatch. The hatch did not need to stay closed. We could look down to see fish swimming, even sit on the lab floor and dangle our feet in the water through the hatch, without flooding the lab. How does this work? See the drawing at right of an elementary science demonstration:

1. Hold a glass upside down over a bowl of water.
2. Push the upside down glass straight down into the water.
3. Water doesn't enter the glass. Water rises in the glass a small amount because air is squeezed by water pressure. As long as you don't tilt the glass too much, the rest of the water stays out.

It works pretty much the same way in an underwater laboratory, summarized in a child's science homework at right. Water stays out and air stays in with everything dry inside, as long as a sea monster doesn't come and knock the lab sideways.

The deeper the lab, the more the air is squeezed and the higher the air pressure. If you bring something full of air down to the lab, it might squash flat by arrival. One of the scientists had a CD-player that I brought down for him in a transfer pot. We opened the pot to find the case bowed inward, so tightly suctioned from inside that it couldn't open.

When transferring gear back up from the lab to the surface, air expands as water pressure decreases. Water-tight cameras had to be transferred open, or they might pop on the way up.

This same "pressure-volume" gas-law relationship applied to the marine toilet, a rectangular plastic box with a screw cap lid. When coming up, air expands. From only 33 feet of seawater (10 meters) to the surface, air volume will double because water pressure is decreased by half. Unless you fill the toilet box completely with water (or other liquids and solids), all gas inside will expand on the way up. It was a test for new interns to see if they understood gas laws to prevent the toilet from expanding enough to explode. Good to understand Boyle's Gas Law.


Related posts on better health and improving fitness in extremes:

• G-forces- Indiana Jones Rocket Sled
• Space Walks
• Three Common Swimming and SCUBA Myths in the News Again
• Respiratory Muscle Training for Swimming, Diving, and Running
• Exercise and Fitness in Decompression Sickness Risk
• Exercise and Medicine Underwater and at High Pressure
• Sixteen Miles of Cold Water
• Altitude Sickness on Flights
• Altitude Sickness, Viagra, and Bubbles on Flights
• Collapsing Astronaut Gives Healthy Reminder
• Forensic Anthropology and Bone Density

Labels: hyperbaric, military fitness, scuba

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Hyperbaric and Aquatic Medicine On Travel

For the next 2 weeks we will be away attending the annual meeting of the Undersea and Hyperbaric Medical Society (UHMS). The post Exercise and Medicine Underwater and at High Pressure tells about the UHMS, the fun people, and the meeting. My friends and colleagues who attend are scientists and flight surgeons, SEAL team captains and commercial divers, submarine and aircraft personnel from navies of many countries. As we like to say, the rest have paying jobs.

I won't have computer access to see comments. Healthline will be changing format for answering reader comments and requests. Before you write with questions, check the hundreds of Fitness Fixer posts already here and all the replies already given to comments. If you still want more, click this post which gives a list of labels. Clicking a label will give all posts on that topic.

I will be posting as always, even on the road. Posts to come while I am away will cover swimming and other topics. Here are posts that cover some of the subjects we study at the meeting:

• Does Hyperbaric Treatment Help Muscle Injuries?
• Does Hyperbaric Treatment Heal Sprains?
• Does Hyperbaric Oxygen Help Exercise Ability?
• Exercise and Fitness in Decompression Sickness Risk
• Hyperbarics for Diabetic Foot Injury
• Respiratory Muscle Training for Swimming, Diving, and Running
• Collapsing Astronaut Gives Healthy Reminder
  
• Altitude Sickness on Flights
• Altitude Sickness, Viagra, and Bubbles on Flights

I am a career researcher in human performance in extremes of environment. That means extremes of heat, cold, altitude, exercise, injury, submersion, crimes (forensics) breathing different gases at different pressures (hyperbarics, see above), different g-forces, sometimes all at once. Many years of my work was spent on immersion physiology. If you are interested in scuba, diving medicine, clinical hyperbarics, wound healing in a hyperbaric environment, check my books page and scroll down toward the bottom for three books on these topics.

Labels: aerospace, altitude, education, military fitness, scuba

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Indiana Jones Rocket Sled

The new Indiana Jones movie came out this past weekend, the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. It is set in 1957 with fun fitness and iconry of the era, for future blog posts. Today - the Rocket Sled.

In the early part of the movie, Indiana Jones and the Soviet Russians brawl through a US military testing base in Nevada. Jones and a Russian officer wind up on a rocket sled, which blasts them on a speed track into the desert.

Rocket sleds are one of several devices that create and test the effects of high acceleration on equipment and the people who use them. High acceleration forces occur when jets take off quickly, when launching a space flight, to eject from a hit (compromised) fighter jet, on roller coasters and spin and fall rides, when you fall from a height, and any time you change speed and/or direction quickly. Interesting changes occur in the body under acceleration. Acceleration is one of the areas of my study as a research physiologist and was my work for a time at two facilities testing air vehicle and human systems.

G-force is a measure of acceleration, not force, but the term g-force is also used for the reaction force that results from acceleration. More on meaning, spelling, and math of g and G in another post. Too much g-force can result in g-LOC (Loss of Consciousness), pronounced "jee-lock"in English, but just as meaningful when using the Cyrillic pronunciation of "loss." When piloting a multi-billion dollar property (the fighter jet) G-LOC is not a good thing for anyone. The pilot may convulse, called "doing an Elvis" because the flailing looks like playing an air guitar - a real air guitar. Then the pilot may "ding" (lose consciousness) and the vehicle may "descend below the level of the terrain" (crash) and "disperse energetically" (explode) and "value unfavorably" (be destroyed), and the crew and anyone they land on may "achieve a negative health status" (die).

So we test.

A rocket sled is a small platform. Rockets propel it on the ground on rails. It creates high onset g-forces for a time limited to the length of the track. When personnel or equipment riding it sit as in a car or plane, they experience acceleration pressing them from front to back (on an x-axis).

To measure the higher g-forces with short onset experienced in jet bail-out procedures, a vertical ejection tower can be used. A small seat is propelled quickly upward by a contained blast force under it (like lighting a bomb). If they are positioned to sit upright, the acceleration acts on them from head to foot, on their y-axis.

To experiment with varying accelerations over different amounts of time and onsets, one device used is a centrifuge. A long support arm swings around and around a center anchoring point -like swinging a ball on a string around your head. A container, often ball shaped, at the end of the support arm holds the equipment or personnel being tested. The ball can rotate to position the people inside at any angle to simulate the changing positioning of a cockpit during maneuvers, for example.

What happens to the people in these testing devices? Often they throw up all over my nice equipment. Some of my test subject pilots used to have contests who could eat the worst thing to redisplay on testing day. One ate plastic bugs just for the fun he was sure to cause - then he didn't throw up, no matter what we did to him. In vertical (y-axis) ejections, there is high impact and acceleration forces on the discs and spine. Back injury is a concern for ejection scenarios. Vibration, both during acceleration and non-acceleration situations, such as for helicopter and jack hammer operators seems to be a high contributor to back pain. It is not known if the various vibration devices sold as fitness devices are of the kind (vibration frequency or amplitude) that contribute to joint pain. G-LOC is another consideration. Why do we test it? To see how to prevent it, if we can screen for who is more likely to get it, if we can train those prone to it to be more resistant, and so on, in g-force tolerance improvement programs (g-TIP).

The set of photos at right is a well-known one of USAF Colonel John Paul Stapp, M.D., Ph.D., riding the rocket sled. He was a pioneer of acceleration study and is also known as the originator of the expression "Murphy's Law" for things that can go wrong. The effect on his face along the x-axis is not from his high speed, but the acceleration which is increasing in photos ii and iii, and decreasing in v and vi. Even though his speed is greatest in photo iv, speed is not increasing or decreasing much, so there is little effect.

More on the interesting effects of acceleration and environmental testing from roller coasters to jets to movies in posts to come.

Related Fitness Fixer:

• Space Walks
• Helium Speech - An Astronaut Calls the President of the United States
• Altitude Sickness on Flights
• A Reader Asks About Osteoporosis and Walking Lightly
  
• Collapsing Astronaut Gives Healthy Reminder
• Click labels under this post for more Fitness Fixer on each topic. For example, for all posts on fitness issues portrayed in the movies or other media, click movie/media fitness.
  

Labels: aerospace, circulation, disc, g-force, injury, lower back, military fitness, movie/media fitness, performance enhancing modality

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Military Grand Rounds

Thank you Nurse Rached for hosting Grand Rounds this week. On the web, each Grand Rounds is a post by someone, with their choices for the best medical posts of the week.

Nurse Rached included my post Back Pain From Running in Grand Rounds this week which included posts, mostly by and about military medical personnel.

Labels: Grand Rounds, military fitness

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Back Pain From Running

One of my areas of injury research for both Army and Navy aeromedical systems was preventing back pain from running. Disease Non-Battle Injuries (DNBI) from exercising in the gym and doing PT is a huge military issue - grounding far more personnel than combat casualty.

I ran several studies and found that overarching (hyperlordosis) is a major overlooked cause of lower back pain - some examples are shown in the post Prevent Back Surgery.

I developed a simple method for people with this kind of back pain to understand and reverse the cause of pain themselves, with simple repositioning to neutral spine instead of overarching. It was unexpected news to some groups who have been taught to overarch, and who deliberately tilt the backside far out in back for exercise. But it was welcome relief for my guys who liked to joke that they were my STRACguys - combat slang for 'stupid troops running around in circles.'

I wrote a little training manual that went through several improvements to become the book, The Ab Revolution™ No More Crunches No More Back Pain. The book has two parts. The first shows how to stop back pain during various standing activity in daily life, both non-active and active, including running. The second part gives ways to exercise core muscles in healthier ways.

Reader Ted found the book and put it to immediate use to stop years of disabling back pain and return to running. Ted wrote:

"I am 57 years old and have weighed 175-lbs for the last 10-years (which drives my doctor nuts). I discovered running in 1969, after gaining weight when I entered college. The track at the University was fenced in, so we'd slide under the fence to run it. I jogged for six years, then raced for another ten years. I wasn't a fast runner, but I hit the legendary ''Second Wind'' on many occasions - you feel like you could Run Forever.......No Time....No Distance.....Just You and the Road.........it is a Mystical Experience....

"I tore out my ankle ligaments in 1980, and had to rehab for a year 'til I could start running again. I have run carrying 2 1/2-lb hand weights for the last 22 years. In 1989, I tore my back. It hurt, then the pain subsided, but flared up every so often."

The only way Ted had then to "cure the pain" was to stop running. Ted continued:

"In 2005 I REALLY hurt it, went into spasms (my wife had taken me shopping for eight hours, and I still blame this on being taken shopping), and the pain made me look back fondly on the Ligament Tear of 1980. After that, it was an All the Time Thing. Running dropped to twice a week (if that) and the slightest thing would trigger a back spasm. I accidentally came upon Dr Bookspan's ''Ab Revolution'' and 'mistakenly' bought it as an exercise book. It's more of a Way of Life, just like running.

"I have been pain-free (amazing) for 12-weeks and counting. I have increased my running to 4-5 days a week. Not having my back killing me is more than I could have hoped for. I thought my running days were over, and I would have missed them.......A LOT.

"The funny part was, I had gotten so used to the pain, it took about three DAYS for me to realize it WASN'T hurting. I cannot recommend the techniques in this book enough to other runners, If you can do The Thing You Love, why WOULDN'T you try this?"

What specifically did Ted do to fix the pain? He writes:

"The two techniques (in the book) I got the results from were the Standing Beginning Crunch with the hands facing each other, and the Where is My Belt Pointing? technique."

Both of these techniques move the spine from the overly -arched position to neutral spine. A summary of the "hands" technique is on the post Innovation in Abdominal Muscles and the beltline pointing is shown in Using Abdominal Muscles is Not Tightening or Pressing Navel to Spine. More step-by-step instructions and photos are in the Ab Revolution manual.

I will ask Ted what's going on with his knee in the photo he sent for this post, and what we can do to fix that up next. I will cover more on back pain after running, and also hope to post some other interesting work I did on the military running chants called jody calls or jodies, and their effect on perceived exertion during running. Check back often.

Labels: endurance, fix pain, military fitness, neutral spine, performance enhancing modality, readers inspiring story, running

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Altitude Sickness, Viagra, and Bubbles on Flights

The previous post Altitude Sickness During Flights told how certain symptoms occurring during air travel are from exposure to altitude.

If a craft were not pressurized, air pressure inside would be equivalent to air pressure outside. At high altitude, there would not be enough air pressure inside the craft for crew to be functional enough to fly. Crew in unpressurized craft wear oxygen-delivery equipment. This was one of my areas of study with the Navy.

Passenger planes are pressurized. The inside is kept at higher pressure than actual flight altitude (equivalent to lower altitude). The pressure inside is still not as much as at sea level. Keeping that much air pressure inside would create extreme metal fatigue on the craft and huge fuel costs. Regular passenger aircraft keep interior pressure equivalent to mild altitude exposure.

In the last few years, Viagra (sildenafil citrate) has been tested by various groups, including the military, as intervention against altitude sickness. Recently, it was also found that the drug reduced symptoms, thought to be jet lag, after flights. My guess is that it was effective for symptoms from flights because of the same properties that may help reduce symptoms, in some, of altitude sickness.

Another component that I discovered many years ago in my work in altitude sickness, was a bubble component - an altogether new dimension to the altitude sickness puzzle. Decompression sickness bubbles can form in the body when coming up after a scuba dive. I found the same kind of bubbles can form in your body when going to elevations encountered in aircraft and mountain travel, with no prior scuba diving. More of this in future posts.

Decompression sickness is also an issue when going into space during extra-vehicular activities. Click Space Walks.

Altitude sickness in flight is different from (or in addition to) the motion sickness of flight motion, or being stiff after not moving enough during long flights. The post Exercise and Stretch for Long Travel Sitting covers some exercises and stretches to relieve those problems.

Altitude exposure is not always a bad thing - certain athletes use altitude training to expose their body to conditions that make it work harder and develop greater oxygen carrying capacity. Future posts will cover different kinds of athletic training at altitude, and training to perform better physically at altitude. Click the labels under this post for more on each topic.

Labels: aerospace, altitude, drugs, injury, military fitness, scuba

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Altitude Sickness on Flights

It has made recent news that certain symptoms during air travel are due to altitude sickness. This seems simple enough. Air pressure inside common passenger aircraft is equivalent to mild altitude exposure.

People who get symptoms when going to the mountains may get the same headache, tiredness, achyness, and other symptoms of altitude in flight. Drinking alcohol adds to symptoms. Severity of symptoms depends on several things, mainly how high the altitude, and how fast you reach it.

Cabin pressure varies with cruising altitude and type of aircraft. During a flight, the inside of a large commercial passenger air flights may range between 5000 to 9000 feet (~1525-2743 meters), occasionally higher or lower. Small lower planes flying may be able to maintain pressures closer to (or equal to) ground pressures.

How fast aircraft reach these altitudes depends on the flight path, final cruising altitude, type of aircraft, and other factors. Some of my commercial pilot friends say they will pressurize the cabin far more gradually when they see babies onboard, so that they (the babies) cry less as pressure changes around their ears. Pressure change on the ears is not altitude sickness, just simple air volume change. Earplugs do not prevent this problem, and can make it worse in some situations. Future posts can cover why.

Susceptibility to altitude sickness does not seem to be affected by better or lesser physical conditioning, or any kind of fitness or physical training. It is still a hugely interesting topic to understanding how the body reacts to and works at altitude, why certain interventions work or don't, and how soon you can fly after going scuba diving - important to risk of decompression sickness.

Reader Bill, athlete and pilot, writes, "Regulations require no more than a 10,000 foot cabin altitude (3048m) be maintained for commercial passenger flights. Anyone not acclimatized to altitudes between 7 to 10 thousand feet (~2-3 thousand meters) will feel some symptoms of a mild hypoxia, surely after several hours or/and a couple stiff drinks."

The next post tells more about altitude sickness on flights and more interesting issues and a few proposed cures - Altitude Sickness, Viagra, and Bubbles on Flights.

Labels: altitude, headache/migraine, injury, military fitness

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Respiratory Muscle Training for Swimming, Diving, and Running

At the diving and hyperbaric conference three weeks ago, I attended sessions on respiratory muscle training for underwater operations. It is a topic of interest for those in charge of combat swimmers, and anyone doing physical training.

In one study, Researchers at the State University of Buffalo at New York found that respiratory muscle training improves swimming and respiratory performance at depth. As you go deeper, the work of breathing can increase, even using high performance breathing devices, because of higher gas density and other factors. They tested the effect of resistance respiratory muscle training on respiratory function and swimming endurance in divers at 55 fsw (~16 m). They found that respiratory muscles were less fatigued following training, breathing rate was lower during the swims, and that the training increased the duration they could swim by about 60%. They concluded that respiratory muscle fatigue limits swimming endurance at depth, and the increase in swimming endurance may result from reduced work of breathing or improved respiratory muscle ability.

The second study by the same group looked at the different benefits of training the endurance and strength of the respiratory muscles. Eighteen SCUBA-certified swimmers were randomly assigned to a placebo group who didn't train their breathing muscles, a respiratory endurance training group, or a respiratory strength training group. Each group used a breathing resistance device five days a week for 30 min over four weeks. The endurance trained group decreased heart rate and ventilation during underwater swims. Both the endurance and strength groups improved fin swimming endurance. The placebo group experienced no changes.

The researchers concluded that respiratory muscle training is effective in improving swimming endurance. They told me they found it is also effective for endurance running, but perhaps not as effective. They are working on finding out why. My friends who do long stints in submarines mentioned they like to use respiratory muscle training to help keep them in shape since they can't go out for a run while on sub duty.

Related:

• The previous post on training breathing muscles -Respiratory Muscle Training for Better Health and Exercise - covers how breathing exercises help increase respiratory capacity in people with various diseases, and physical training in athletes.
• The post Do Breathing Exercises Work? shows ways to do breathing training without respiratory training devices.
  
• The book Healthy Martial Arts gives more.

Labels: aerobic, breathing, endurance, hyperbaric, military fitness, performance enhancing modality, scuba, strength, swimming

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Independence Day for Fitness

Today is Independence Day in the United States. The Declaration of Independence was drafted in June of 1776. Signing began by July. The paper itself didn't grant independence - work continued until independence came a few years later. After getting the idea to do something, the next thing is to take action. Here are ideas for a life free from things that are unhealthy - pain, unhealthful food, and exercises that reinforce bad habits:

Freedom from junk food:

Instead of soda, put a red sweet pepper in a food grinder. Cut about an inch of fresh ginger root and add through the grinder. In about 30 seconds preparation time you will have a sweet, cool, red, slushy drink with an exotic tang of ginger. Healthy and good tasting.

Instead of refined sugar sports drinks, put a peeled whole cucumber into the food grinder or low speed blender with a whole kiwi fruit. It will make a sweet, cool, slushy, green drink.

Instead of processed peanut butter and refined sugar jelly, put fresh raw nuts and apple slices into a grinder, mill, or chopper. In less than a minute of preparation time, you have a sweet nut butter that you can spread on fruit slices, carrots, and other good foods. Try walnuts, almonds, other fresh raw nuts, and experiment with different fruit combination to make different sweet creamy fresh nut butters.

For more recipes, Healthy Martial Arts has an entire chapter on nutrition.

Freedom from overeating

Just as you can't go through red lights every time you just feel like it, or hit someone any time you just feel like it, you don't just eat anything you feel like it at any time. That is unhealthy. Some people say any denial is unhealthy. That is like saying you can just wet your pants when you feel like it. Self-control is cleaner in body and spirit:
Exercise Common Sense Discipline - Turn Down Halloween Junk Food
A Little Good Exercise, a Lot of Bad Food - Overweight Still No Mystery

Freedom from unhealthy drugs and medicines:

Masses of products crowding store shelves claim to fix this and cure that. Millions of dollars are spent. The products seem dazzling, but much is hype and many produce unhealthy effects. Then more dollars are spent on more pills and products for the new problems caused by the medicines. Many prescribed medicines cause new problems that can be avoided. Stop the cycle and save yourself time, money, and unhappiness. If it is not healthy, it is not health care:
Teen Dies After Using Muscle Soreness Rub
Human Growth Hormone
Is Your Health Food Unhealthful?
Stomach Acid Drugs Increase Osteoporosis and Hip Fractures

Freedom from physical pain and injuries:

At the Special Operations Medical Association conference two years ago, it was released that 62% of our American injuries in Iraq are "Disease Non-Battle Injuries"(DNBI) - not from combat or supporting operations, but occurring in the gym. At the ACSM conference last month, a research study reported that their American military units had 17% DNBI injuries. I asked them how they kept their numbers so low. They replied that the number was for evacuations - injuries so serious they required removal from the base. Some of the most common exercise and stretching practices are not healthy. It is not that they are not good for some people or that they are overuse or done "wrong" - they are inherently bad movements. The same high injury rate is happening to fitness and yoga and Pilates instructors and students. I wrote about this in Welcome to the Fitness Fixer. Here are some specifics on why and what to do instead:
Why So Many Aerobics Injuries?
The Stretch You Need The Least
Sitting Badly Isn't Magically Healthy by Calling It a Hamstring Stretch
Safer Overhead Military Press
Are You Making Your Exercise Unhealthy?

Freedom from neck pain:

Fixing Upper Back and Neck Pain
Nice Neck Stretch
Breasts Causing Upper Back Pain is a Myth

Freedom from mental pain:

Healthier Heart
Exercise Your Sense of Humor
Which Ancient Exercise Gives Focus and Concentration?

Freedom from crunches:

Abdominal crunches are a popular exercise, but they are not healthy. This is new and different information, I know. Crunches "work" your abdominal muscles, but not in a healthful or beneficial way, whether done sitting or standing or using a machine. Crunches also train rounded bad posture that you know is unneeded and unhealthy when sitting or standing that way in real life.

The idea that strengthening the abdominal muscles stops back pain is a myth. Many muscular people have pain. They do their crunches, then stand and move in the overly-arched spinal posture that is the hallmark sign that the abs are not even being used, and which creates one major kind of chronic pain: Fixing the Commonest Source of Mystery Lower Back Pain

Crunches do not automatically make you use your abdominal muscles to position your spine to support your back. You do that on your own: What Abdominal Muscles Don't Do - The Missing Link.

Neutral spine has a small inward curve to the lower spine, just not a large one:
What is Neutral Spine and Why Does Sticking Out In Back Harm?
Aren't You Supposed To Stick Your Behind Out to Sit Down or Do Squats?

The simple act of standing and doing all your activities and exercise without letting your lower spine overly arch, and instead keeping neutral spine, uses more abdominal muscle involvement than doing crunches: Using Abdominal Muscles is Not Tightening or Pressing Navel to Spine.

Functional abdominal exercises use no forward bending: Abdominal Muscle Exercise - Better, Different, Not What You Think

The book No More Crunches No More Back Pain The Ab Revolution explains a healthier better way to use and exercise your abs (114 illustrations 124 pages). I have a number of copies of the new 3rd edition expanded to give to military personnel as gifts. Contact me to send one (free) to someone you know, to keep our guys healthy.

Independence is Healthy:
This post included links to a few past posts about being free of unhealthy things. Click the labels below each post for more related posts. Keep the things you do, eat, and think healthy. If a medicine is not healthy, it is not health care. If an exercise trains injurious body mechanics, use the time for healthier exercises that are more fun. There are better, healthier ways. Be free.

Labels: abdominal muscles, drugs, fix pain, holiday, injury, military fitness, neck, nutrition, performance enhancing modality, spirit, stress, upper back, weight loss

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Respiratory Muscle Training for Better Health and Exercise

At the American College of Sports Medicine conference last month, I attended an entire session on effects of training respiratory muscle function. Back when I was in school, we learned that the ability to breathe harder, better, faster, could not be trained with exercise or other modality, that it was fixed from person to person, like eye color, except that it got worse with aging, and that it didn't matter much, since ventilation did not do much to limit exercise potential anyway.

Even though the lungs don't have any muscles of their own, it didn't seem right to me, as the diaphragm and muscles that move the rib cage to voluntarily breath in and out are muscles like any other. What if there are people whose respiratory muscles are not trained to work hard enough and add to the metabolic cost of exercise, increasing fatigue and so, limit exercise? It is also true that many people are not in good enough shape to use more oxygen, so breathe most of the oxygen back out with each breath, even when exercising strenuously. What about someone in great athletic shape who could use that oxygen. Why couldn't they be trained to move more air faster if they needed some?

Exercising the muscles that you use to breath in (inspiratory muscle training) is known to improve the endurance of the respiratory muscles in people with spinal cord injury and cystic fibrosis, and is shown to improve exercise capacity in patients with heart failure. What about for people without these conditions or for athletes?

There is some published literature that does not show improved work capacity (J Sports Sci. 1991 Spring;9(1):43-52.) and some that show high-intensity training increases exercise capacity in people who are healthy (Phys Ther. 2006 Mar;86(3):345-54.).

Combat swimmers have long used various breathing training to get in shape for swims and other strenuous work. The diving medicine conference I attended two weeks ago had several studies that showed interesting and promising results with breathing training.

More on Pulmonary and Respiratory Training:

• Coming next - Respiratory Muscle Training for Swimming, Diving, and Running.
• Respiratory muscle training in the above studies did not involve popping corks from your lips, as in the photo. To improve your breathing capacity and do training at home without respiratory training devices, see the Fitness Fixer post Do Breathing Exercises Work? and the book Healthy Martial Arts.

Labels: aerobic, breathing, circulation, endurance, military fitness, performance enhancing modality, scuba, strength, swimming

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Exercise and Medicine Underwater and at High Pressure

For the next week, I will be at scientific meeting of the Undersea and Hyperbaric Medical Society (UHMS). My colleagues attending are flight surgeons, SEAL team captains, commercial divers, submersible and submarine craft personnel from navies of many countries, and scientists from all over the world who study the science of what happens to the body when working under different pressures, temperatures, and breathing gases - at altitude, underwater, and in the specialized dry compartments to build bridges and structures deep underwater. There are also physicians, technicians, nurses, and aerospace scientists and astronauts who use hyperbaric chamber technology to prevent or treat specific non-diving conditions. Allied health workers, divers, and non-divers also attend.

Originally, we were the Undersea Medical Society (UMS). As use of high-pressure oxygen chambers to treat illnesses other than diving climbed, more sessions on how hyperbaric oxygen works (and doesn't work) were added. Wound healing increased in focus. In 1986, we became the Undersea and Hyperbaric Medical Society (UHMS). Forums, sometimes strangely heated for brainy, cool-headed scientists, are held about which conditions legitimately respond to hyperbaric oxygen treatment and which are felt not to have evidence (no matter how much we wish it would work and alleviate the suffering of the patients).

Some of the established benefits of hyperbaric oxygen and some uses that are not shown to be effective are explained in the post and comments of Does Hyperbaric Oxygen Help Exercise Ability?

The meeting will cover many interesting topics in decompression bubbles that are thought to cause (or be part of) decompression sickness, or "the bends," and mathematical and empirical models of decompression. Decompression theory and bubbles were my research area for many years along with the effects of too much oxygen on the body during exercise underwater and in dry habitats underwater. The meeting will have many sessions in clinical hyperbaric oxygen therapy for several specific conditions (abbreviated HBO, HBOT, HB02 and other), chamber equipment, and wound treatment. There will be a session of The Veterinary Hyperbaric Medicine Society. Animals get problem wounds that need help healing, too.

The national board exam for hyperbaric chamber nurse and technician will be administered. There is also a board exam for physicians in hyperbaric medicine held each fall through the American Board of Preventive Medicine & Emergency Medicine. I wrote the study guides for both exams. I tried to make them fun, user-friendly, and packed with understanding, not just lists of facts and equations to memorize. The guides cover the entire contents of both areas and are a nice review or compendium for anyone interested I the field. Info is on my web site books page.

I won't be staying at the fancy conference hotel but at a backpacker's hostel. Over the next week, I will try to get to Internet cafes to post on some of the interesting topics and research at the meeting - and swim and go underwater for real. That is good for a researcher in underwater exercise and medicine to do.


Here is the next post from the conference Hyperbarics for Diabetic Foot Injury.

Labels: aerospace, education, hyperbaric, injury, military fitness, scuba

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