Healthy Connections

Preventing Heat stress in the Workplace

HCC — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 08:20:40 +0000

There is a heart alert in effect across America and officials are encouraging employers and employees to educate themselves about preventing heat stress, which can be quite harmful.

Heat stress is hazardous to people of all ages, and whether or not you are physically fit, it can still affect you. furthermore, it is a major concern in workplaces. Hard physical work, fluid loss, fatigue, and some medical conditions can each lead to illness, disability, or even death.

Heat stress symptoms include:

excessive sweating headache
rashes
cramping, dizziness
fainting

Here are some tips to protect you from heat stress:

Drink lots of fluids to replace perspiration. Drink a cup of water approximately every 20 minutes.
Avoid working in direct sunlight (to reduce heat gain and risk of sunburn)
Reduce the pace of work
Increase the number of breaks. Take breaks in cool or shaded areas
Schedule heavy work during cooler periods of the day
Wear light-colored and/or light-weight clothing
Reduce the physical demands of work by using aides, i.e. hoists.

New Rules: Insurance Must Cover Screenings

HCC — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 04:13:26 +0000

Although much of the furor over health care reform has died down, many of the new law’s most controversial provisions — the insurance mandate, for example — have yet to take effect. But last week, Congress took a major step forward by requiring health insurance companies to provide free coverage for a number of preventive screenings.

Going forward, according to the New York Times, insurance companies must cover a variety of preventive services, including:

Cholesterol, diabetes, and blood pressure tests
Cancer screenings
HIV screenings
Vaccinations
Prenatal care, as well doctor visits for infants and children
Smoking cessation counseling
Obesity screening and counseling

Of course, just because the law requires insurance plans to cover preventive screenings, that doesn’t mean people will take advantage of the opportunity. That’s why it’s more important than ever to raise awareness through employee wellness programs . A health fair or an onsite seminar may be all it takes to get the ball rolling for some of your employees.

Personal Metrics: Digitally Tracking Your Goals

HCC — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 22:28:06 +0000

In the past 10 years the way we have digitized our lives has accelerated at a rapid pace. With the rise of smart phones and devices such as the Apple iPod Touch, we have instant access to every aspect of our lives 24/7. We don’t go 15 minutes without checking our email, the weather, or the news.

So why not check up on ourselves as well?

The increasing popularity of personal metrics is making self check ups every day or hour or 15 minutes more and more of a possibility. So what are personal metrics? Personal metrics is the data collected from digitally tracking your weight loss, sleep cycles, moods, or almost any physical aspect of yourself through the use of apps.

As a Wired article from 2008 noted:

We can live longer and better by applying, on a personal scale, the same quantitative mindset that powers Google and medical research. Call it Living by Numbers—the ability to gather and analyze data about yourself, setting up a feedback loop that we can use to upgrade our lives, from better health to better habits to better performance.

Here are some of our favorite apps for tracking our personal metrics.

Nike+ for iPod Nano, Touch, and iPhone
It tracks your speed, distance, and calories burned, actually translate that data so you can see your progress through an interactive chart.

Calorie Tracker from Livestrong.com
It allows users to input their daily exercise and food intake to create a digital diary that helps them reach their weight loss and fitness goals.

Sleep Cycle Alarm Clock
It will track your sleep cycle including deep sleep and dreaming and all you have to do is put it under your pillow and go to dreamland!

Choice By Choice
This is a great app to track your life goals, from getting a new job to running a marathon. By inputing all your goals and then noting when you make strides towards or away from them, Choice By Choice keeps your total life goals tracked.

BollyBasics Classes

HCC — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 03:56:42 +0000

This event repeats weekly until June 14, 2011

Dhoonya Dance is holding BollyBasics classes on:

Tuesdays 8-9pm, Wednesdays 6-7pm and Saturday 12-1pm

219 W 19th Street. Register online at http://www.dhoonyadance.com/classes. When registering, enter the code PS199 to receive a $10 discount on the first class! BollyBasics is designed to work with your busy schedule therefore classes do not need to be taken in a series. You can drop-in whenever you have time because in each class you will a full, new routine. These are simple, repetit… (read more)

Hoop Dance / Exercise Class

HCC — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 03:48:18 +0000

This event repeats weekly until August 30, 2010

Come to our weekly Hooping exercise dance class at Nomahegan Park Cranford, NJ. Learn basic hooping skills. Strengthen and sculpt your core while having a hooping good time. This class is for everyone that wants to smile while working towards their fitness goals. Hoops are larger and heavier than the hoops of your childhood. Hoops will be available for sale or rent.

Cost: Payment required – $5 for class, $3 to rent a hoop. Hoops are available for purchase $30.

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