Wellness coordinator tells students how to Be Well
Disease, rising healthcare costs and obesity can be prevented by limiting fat and sugar intake and increasing activity, said a registered dietitian as she spoke to students about “why wellness matters.”
Caroline Shugart, Employee Wellness coordinator for USU, said the damage caused by excess fat is toxic, irreversible and “affects every organ in the body.” During her lecture Wednesday in the Animal Science building, she pulled out about a 12-inch, 3-D representation of five pounds of body fat to put things in perspective for students, she said.
Excess body fat compresses the heart and lungs, she said, and puts abnormal weight on the skeletal system which leads to hip fractures and knee replacements. Corrective surgeries cost about $50,000 and only last about 15 years, she said.
One specific unhealthy habit that leads to gaining excess body fat is the over-consumption of sugar, she said. According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, CDC, she said 33 percent of Caucasian children, 40 percent of African-American children and 50 percent of Hispanic children born after 2000 will develop diabetes.
“It’s very expensive, what we’re doing to kids, and I think it’s very unethical,” Shugart said.
Future generations are threatened by the obesity epidemic, she said, because excess body fat leads to a shorter lifespan, higher health care costs and toxic effects like brain lesions seen in Alzheimer’s patients.
A 2005 telephone survey of 356,000 Americans, conducted by the CDC, she said, reported only one in seven people gets enough exercise or eats the recommended five servings of fruits and vegetables each day.
Shugart said she sees the effects of these poor health choices when she works at Logan Regional Hospital Dialysis Center. She works about three nights a month and sticks needles in the patients’ arms, removes the blood and cleans it through a dialysis filter.
“I’m kind of like a human vampire,” she said, “but I give the blood back.”
Patients are hooked to dialysis machines for about 12 hours a week, she said. One-third of them has diabetes and one-third has high blood pressure, she said, which could be prevented with more activity and controlled sugar intake. For this reason, Shugart said she counsels people to make time to exercise so they can avoid dialysis treatment and disease.
Seventy percent of disease could be prevented if people changed their eating habits and exercised more, she said. Along with the negative physical effects of unhealthy living is the financial burden of paying for health care. Shugart said each year in the U.S., $2.2 trillion is spent on sickness which is 16 percent of the gross national product.
“I would not even call it health care anymore,” she said. “We should call it sick care. I’m so disturbed by it. At what point is enough, enough? We’ve got to tackle this problem.”
One way Shugart said she is attempting to prevent sickness, obesity and disease is through the campus program, Be Well, the goal of which is to “create active student wellness that we can thrive in.”
Through this program, many exercise options are encouraged, she said, such as the Fieldhouse, physical education classes, campus recreation and new walking routes. There are signs which map out 2-mile and 1.4-mile routes, she said, and the new walking club provides prizes and encouragement for motivation.
“The magic bullet of modern medicine is exercise,” she said.
Shugart said she recommends at least 30 minutes of daily aerobic exercise, weight training twice a week and stretching and flexibility twice a week. But she also said “the best exercise is one you enjoy.” People who fail to exercise and suffer from obesity restrict their chances for many experiences she said, suggesting scuba diving and hang gliding.
“Our bodies are made to be active, lean and strong,” she said. “Sickness limits our opportunities in life.”
Shugart has been a dietitian for more than 20 years and said she feels that eating healthy helps people to “be their best.” Fruits, vegetables and high-fiber whole grains reduce the risk of disease, she said, and also make people happier and more productive.
Another part of the Be Well makeover is a new program at the Hub and the Quad Side Café, she said, where students receive 10 percent off their purchase if they choose all healthy options and if they buy 10 healthy choices, they get one free.
Shugart said her philosophy for making healthy lifestyle changes is to set goals that are obtainable. One goal for people to start with is to find alternatives for food and drink choices, she said, like substituting water for sugar drinks and soda pop.
The average person consumes 50 gallons of soda a year, she said, which is more than milk or bottled water consumption. A 20-ounce container of pop contains about 15 to 17 teaspoons of sugar, she said, which is leading to excess body fat, diabetes and sugar addicts relying on their “bottle of sugar, like a baby needs his pacifier.”
“We need to wean ourselves,” she said, “and moderate our portions.”
Eliminating 20 ounces of soda pop per day for a year, she said would cut out 91,250 calories or 26 pounds of body fat. Other substitutions she said are mustard for mayonnaise, cooking spray for oil and sugar-free jam for butter. All these alternatives cut calories and reduce fat intake, she said.
“We want to expand minds, not waistlines,” she said.
Shugart said USU has some additional free health-related opportunities for students and employees such as personal trainers, fitness assessments and a registered dietitian, Marlee Harris, who students can contact at 797-8080 to set up an appointment to create a personalized, healthy diet plan.
Along with understanding portion-control and frequent exercise, Shugart said people need to be aware of the enticing marketing tactics of advertising industries. Campaigns attempt to trigger cues for sugar and fat, she said but “we need an environment that triggers healthy behaviors.”
–n.joy.hansen@aggiemail.usu.edu