health education | wellness

Author: Amy

  • Get Healthier Skin Now in 4 Easy Steps

    Get Healthier Skin Now in 4 Easy Steps

    Your skin is the first thing most people may notice about you. Whether it’s glowing and radiant, or dull and blotchy, skin can say a lot about your internal health, too. Since you only get one chance to make a first impression, it’s important that you take skin care seriously. Here are a few simple ways to achieve beautiful, healthier skin.

    Sun protection for healthier skin

    healthier skin

    This first tip is the arguably most important to achieving beautiful, young-looking, healthier skin. Always wear sunscreen outdoors, rain or shine. Apply it generously all over your body, and pay close attention to your face. Don’t forget to cover your nose – it’s the one place that gets sunburned the quickest. You’re not just protecting your skin from being burned, but you’re also preventing premature wrinkles. Make sure you lather on plenty the next time you’re catching a few rays! Also consider wearing a wide-brim hat.

    Rejuvenating sleep

    Ensuring adequate sleep also plays a vital part in skin care. The reason is quite simple. Your body—skin included—is rejuvenated while you sleep. While you’re catching some Z’s, your skin has a chance to heal itself. Getting too little sleep can not only damage your skin – it’ll also make you look tired. How many people look their best when they’re tired? You know the answer to that question.

    Balanced diet

    healthier skin

    A healthy, balanced diet is good for your skin and is the most vital aspect of your overall health. Eating foods high in antioxidants will keep your skin looking healthy and impart a young glow.

    Reach for a piece of watermelon, which is rich in lycopene. Lycopene prevents wrinkling and even skin cancer. You probably never thought about that while eating this refreshing fruit! Make sure you stock up on it during the summer months.

    Avoid hot showers

    Avoid taking hot showers. It feels good taking a hot steamy shower but doing so will dry out your skin because the heat and water strip essential oils from your skin. This is one of the reasons why your skin becomes so itchy after a shower—not to mention all that hot water has made your skin dryer than a desert. Instead, take a shower in lukewarm water and your skin will thank you.

    As you can see there are many ways to ensure to get healthier skin, and these are easy-to-follow tips that anyone can do. By following these simple steps, you’ll feel better and look better. After all, if you’re healthy, your skin will be, too! Making changes is the only way to get healthier skin today and prevent premature aging tomorrow!

  • Making Lifestyle Changes: How to Stay Motivated

    Making Lifestyle Changes: How to Stay Motivated

    When you are making lifestyle changes to better your life and get healthy, staying motivated can get a bit tricky over time. Although we start our new habits with the best of intentions, sometimes we get overwhelmed and life gets in the way. Staying active and healthy for the long term can only be possible by also learning skills for lifestyle management. If you’ve starting making lifestyle changes recently to better your life or health and want to stay motivated for a long period, here are a few steps to take.

    Set realistic goals when making lifestyle changes

    Making Lifestyle Changes

    The most outstanding goals are smart, realistic, specific, achievable, appropriate, time limited, and measurable. If you’re exercising for the first time in your life, choose a local mountain to climb rather than Mount Everest.

    Create an obvious vision of your goal

    In order to reach your goal, you must have an obvious vision of exactly what you want in the end. If your goal is physical fitness, see yourself as healthy and strong while climbing mountains, skiing, or canoeing.

    Identify personal benefits

    Making Lifestyle Changes

    Your goals must be correlated to your personal benefits. If you desire an end goal, it is imperative to love that goal. If your end goal is physical fitness, for example, you must love the feeling of being healthy and strong enough to ski, hike, swim, ride your bike, etc. By identifying your precise benefits rather than ambiguous benefits like “I will be healthier” you’ll be more likely to stay motivated to reach your goal in ways that matter to you.

    Consider the influences on those you love most

    Opting for a healthy lifestyle is not only beneficial for you, but is also indirectly benefits those whom you love most such as your spouse, partner, children, or parents. Becoming physically active and stronger gives you the energy needed to have fun with the ones you love. Improving relationships is a wonderfully reinforcing way to stay motivated to maintain your healthy lifestyle.

    The endurance motivator

    Making Lifestyle Changes

    Once you have made up your mind to change your life, you need something positive to look forward to. Making lifestyle changes and shifting old habits are not easy tasks and you should learn why your goal matters to you enough to go through the trouble.

    What is your vision of what your life can be if you have your health and fitness? How do you see yourself at your best, and why is that worth sticking with new changes no matter how hard that will feel? What are you trying to achieve or be physically capable of doing that matters to you? Maybe you want to partake in a fundraiser walk-a-thon or be able to get around when you travel abroad. Once you know this, have ways to remind yourself every day, and keep your eye on the prize.

    Set reminders for yourself

    Leaving a reminder like placing a note on your refrigerator or setting an alarm reminder on your phone can help you to remember the ongoing task of accomplishment.

    Reward yourself for making lifestyle changes!

    Choose accolades for accomplishing your goals. Treating yourself and celebrating your accomplishments creates a positive association with hard work and allows you to take a step back and see the remarkable changes you’ve made.

    Trying implementing a few of these motivational tips that can help you reach your goals!

  • How to Improve Your Bedside Manner

    How to Improve Your Bedside Manner

    While the majority of patients and their families appreciate the help and healing offered by healthcare providers, many also complain that the healthcare industry has become too impersonal and bureaucratic. They often cite historical references to the olden days when doctors were more personally acquainted with each patient, and report that nowadays they are not given enough one-on-one attention.

    Improve Your Bedside Manner

    Organizations have not only grown bigger, but technology has removed much of the human element in caregiver-to-patient interactions, as healthcare facilities strive to be more productive, efficient, and affordable.

    Steps to Improve Your Beside Manner

    There are steps you can take though, and here are four tips to improve your bedside manner that can make a real difference in how you are perceived by patients.

    1. Professional Can Also Be Friendly

    You need to maintain a professional demeanor, but that does not mean you cannot be warm and friendly. Greet the patient, make sure you pronounce their name correctly, and offer them energetic focus. Resist the urge to see them as a problem or puzzle to be solved before you move along to the next patient, and that extra effort will score lots of positive points.

    2. Nonverbal Communication Matters

    Improve Your Bedside Manner

    Do make eye contact and shake your patient’s hand. Don’t just stare at a chart, clipboard, or computer. Do stand up straight, smile, and try to sit at the same eye level as the person to whom you are talking. Don’t write, read, or look away while they are answering your questions.

    3. Let the Patient Explain the Problem

    Let the patient describe in their own words how they feel, what their symptoms are, how long they have felt that way, and why they came to see you. Oftentimes the patient will provide information or insights that you would otherwise miss, and that can be critically important. The tone they use and the words they choose can also be key indicators of their level of well-being or stress.

    4. Reassure Patients and Family Members

    You don’t have to make promises in order to offer reassurance. Let patients and family know they are in good hands and that you will do everything to help them and try to ensure their comfort. If you don’t verbalize that, they may not feel safe or secure, and a little reassurance can emotionally and psychologically aid in a faster recovery.

  • Warning Signs of Caregiver Fatigue

    Warning Signs of Caregiver Fatigue

    Caring for others, although rewarding, can be an extremely strenuous experience with caregiver fatigue being a rather common occurrence. Caregivers may not just be physically worn-out, but they may also be emotionally drained or psychologically depleted.

    Warning Signs of Caregiver Fatigue

    Making sacrifices for the benefit of others is noble, but to continue in a sustainable way, you also need to make sure than you take care of yourself and your own health and well being. So here is a list of telltale warning signs of caregiver fatigue that can help you realize when fatigue is setting in, so that you can do what is necessary to recharge your batteries, rest, and recuperate.

    Warning Signs of Caregiver Fatigue

      • You have less energy to do the things you typically enjoy, or you are losing interest in the activities you normally enjoy.
      •  You are more susceptible to getting sick, coming down with colds and flu, or you feel achy and grouchy all the time.
      • Even if you take some “me” time and rest or have a nap, you still feel tired-out and exhausted.
      • Your schedule is so hectic that you have to skip things that are really meaningful to you – or you feel like you are constantly in a state of emergency and chaos.
      • Although you are devoted to caring for others, you are not feeling rewarded and satisfied from that endeavor.
      •  You overreact to situations and lose your cool, or those you are trying to care for make you feel irritated and upset.
      •  You are eating, drinking, or otherwise overindulging in ways that are unhealthy and not like your normal behavior.
      • You toss and turn at night or have frequent nightmares.
      • Your appetite is not healthy enough and you are skipping meals and losing more weight than is healthy – for example, more than two pounds per week.
      • Resentment or jealousy or anger are emotions that you feel more and more, despite having many things for which you actually feel grateful.

    If you notice that you are starting to register any warning signs of caregiver fatigue – or multiple symptoms on this list – seek the support and help of others. Talk to your doctor, for example, and set aside time to heal and refresh yourself so that you can continue to serve as a caregiver without neglecting your own important care. For more information, check out this great resource on HelpGuide.org.

  • Two Effective Stretches for Healthcare Workers

    Two Effective Stretches for Healthcare Workers

    Healthcare workers are typically on their feet all day, leaning over to help lift patients in a way that can put considerable strain on the body – especially the lower back. You may also work in a health care setting where you are relegated to doing lots of paperwork at the computer. But sitting for long periods of time also creates others kinds of muscular tension and can also be dangerous to your health.

    Two Effective Stretches for Healthcare Workers

    effective stretches for healthcare workers

    Here are two easy stretches to help give you some healthy relief:

    Standing Side Stretch

    • Stand with your feet together and your arms straight overhead. Put your hands together with fingers pointed toward the sky.
    • Now take a long deep breath, and as you inhale reach upward and extend your arms.
    • With arms extended and fingers still pointing bend at the waist to move and tilt your upper body to the right. As you perform this movement slowly exhale.
    • Maintain this side stretch for the length of 2-3 slow deep breaths. Then slowly return to center, to your original position.
    • Repeat the side bend, this time on the left side.

    Cobra Pose

    • Lie on the floor on an exercise mat, face down, and place your palms on the floor at your shoulders – so that your thumbs are right beneath your shoulders.
    • Keep legs extended and together with the tops of your feet on the floor and the soles of your feet facing the sky.
    • As you engage the muscles of your abs and core, tuck your hips downward and also pull the shoulders downward away from your ears.
    • Pushing with your palms, gently raise your chest as you take a long, deep inhale. Keep your head upright as you push your chest out and press your palms into the floor.
    • Exhale as you relax back into your original prone position. Repeat this exercise 3-5 times.

    To further ensure your health and well being, sign up for a free stretching class or beginning yoga class in your community. Many hospitals offer this kind of class for free to their employees, or you can find out about other opportunities by asking someone in the physical therapy or human resources department where you work.