HRE #14: Tobacco & Cessation Programs

Tobacco causes over 440,000 deaths each year! It is important to continue discussing its risk factors and how it greatly impacts our lives and our health. This student's project uncovers the truths about smoking.

In his research, he listed 5 main reasons why people start smoking in the first place:
"The 5 reasons would be: peer pressure, curiosity, their guardians/ parents, advertisements, and their role models. But later on some people decide to quit, but not many. Reasons people would quit would be because of health, first of all."

Regarding second-hand smoke:
"Dangers of secondhand smoke are the same as direct smokers, such as heart disease, cardiovascular disease, lung cancer, asthma, etc. This is a danger to our society because statistics show that non-smokers with partners who smoke in the home have a 20–30% greater risk of lung cancer, and those exposed to cigarette smoke in the workplace have an increased risk of 16–19%."

The student viewed a short film on how advertising companies market tobacco. Here are his thoughts on the movie:
"This film showed us how tobacco and alcohol companies are desperate to get people, especially young people to purchase their product. The tobacco companies make their advertisements glamorous and fun to smoke. Just as the alcohol companies do the same, but in reality, it’s killing you little by little. But the one thing the advertising companies of tobacco and alcohol do not advertise are the dangers and health risks of their products. They also never advertise how many people die every year instead they try to advertise newer and fun advertisements to attract younger viewers. But the film did not discuss a topic on how to resolve these problems. Instead of the government spending money on anti- advertisements against these companies, they should have used some of the tax hikes from these products to give free treatments to quit these addictions. Because now you have companies that sell their medications at high prices and treatments to help you quit at a high price and most people cannot afford them, so most people continue smoking and drinking. It’s not just advertisements that get young people to start these addictions, its parents and adults by their actions. So the best way to stop smoking and drinking is to “DON’T START”!!!!"

The student was asked to mark all the areas on campus where students were found smoking. Notice that some areas are NOT designated smoking places. (Click on the picture to get a bigger view)
















The student created podcasts where he interviewed smokers and non-smokers on their thoughts on smoking on campus - should it be allowed? Listen to their responses:
(podcasts will be up soon)


And the student also created a Public Service Announcement (PSA) on smoking and why one should quit - or better yet, never start!

HRE #12: Alternative Health and Medicine

The purpose of this project was to explore naturopathic medicines and other complementary alternative practices to allopatic (western) medicine. Below are highlighted excerpts from student's research and experiences:

What is Naturopathic Medicine?
"Philosophies and practices that seek to improve health and treat disease chiefly by assuming the body’s innate capacity to recover from
illness and injury. Philosophies include:
Homeopathy, a form of alternative medicine, by treating imbalances in a hypothetical vital force. Traditional Asian Medicine, herbal medicine, acupuncture and massage
Diet and Supplements, dealing with a healthy diet and vitamin supplements
Hydrotherapy, involves the use of water for soothing pains and treating diseases."

"Alternative medicine is defined as “quackery” because along time ago a report was written and a lot of people and western culture (allopathic) don’t believe in natural healing. Many of there techniques are unusual and people want a quite fix, and just want to get there problem fixed quickly. The naturopathic way takes more time and effort cause it sometimes means a lifestyle change, some people aren’t willing to make that change."

"Naturopathic doctors and western medicine doctors go through the same type of schooling in the beginning. They get their undergrad, basic pre-med, and take many of the same courses for example bio-chem. Naturopathic students also take more farm logy, nutrition, and mind, body and spirit courses. A naturopath goes through four years of schooling. First two years are their basic sciences and the final two years are focusing on clinical applications."

For her field experience, the student was asked to spend an entire day visiting the Southwest College of Naturopathic Medicine as a prospective applicant. Here are some brief thoughts about her experience:
"After doing the research and visiting SCNM I’ve really taken an interest in alternative medicine. I find it amazing and would like to partake in some of there practices. a lot of there methods are off the wall but people believe that they work, so I don’t think anything is a bad thing if people are getting healthier. Cardiovascular disease and cancer can be caused by lifestyle and one of the areas naturopaths focus on is lifestyle change. That could relatively lower both disease rates. Holistic means a complete well being to me. It reminds me of the complete package, because the focus is getting body, mind and spirit all balanced out. I find it fascinating and would like to try some of the methods in the future."

Here is her Public Service Announcement on moving towards a holistic lifestyle.

HRE #11: Cancer Society and Social Support

The focus of this student project was on cancer - the research of it, but more importantly, the cultural implications of cancer. How much of our lifestyle impacts the cause of cancer and what type of medical and social support exists. Below are highlighted excerpts from this project:

"The top three cancers for men are prostate, lung, and colon cancer. The top three cancers for women include breast, lung and colon cancer. Eighty percent of all cancer is caused by your lifestyle or environment some factors include: Sun Exposure, Tobacco, Alcohol, Unhealthy Diet, and you should all take a health education class to further inform you on this topic. By changing theses five things, you can live a longer and healthier life. Phytochemicals also play a role in cancer. Phytochemicals are found in fruits and vegetables, they can stop the shaping of the cancerous tumors and can stop cancer from starting. Some examples of phytochemicals would be PEITC which keeps carcinogenes from binding to DNA, you can get this from broccoli. There are also flavonoids that are found in most fruits and vegetables and it helps cancer causing hormones from locking onto the cells. Phytochemicals are also found in green tea."

"Lung cancer is the [a] type of cancer that is found both in men and women. Some risk factors for lung cancer include: gender, somking status, type of smoking, number of cigarettes per day, type of cigarette, duration of smoking and type of industrial work. Males have a higher risk of getting lung cancer. The chance of getting lung cancer will increase with age. People who smoke cigarettes have twenty times the chance of getting lung cancer than from those that don’t smoke. Cigarette smokers have a higher chance of getting lung cancer than those who smoke a pipe or cigar and people who smoke a pipe or cigar have a greater chance of getting lung cancer than those who don’t smoke. If a man smokes less than half a pack per day he has five times greater risk than those who don’t smoke. If a man smokes one or two packs per day then he has fifteen times higher chance of getting lung cancer. If he smokes more than two packs per day this chances went up to twenty times higher than a non smoker. Exposure to materials that industries use can also cause lung cancer. For example if you are exposed to arsenic, radiation or air pollution, it can also cause lung cancer. To help prevent lung cancer, don’t smoke and stay away from people who do. If you do smoke, it’s never too early to quit. Some warning signs include coughing, chest pain, shortness of breath, weight loss, bloody sputum, loss of appetite, and wheezing. If you some and have most of there symptoms, call your doctor right away."

Below is an excerpt of this student's personal frustrations with loved ones who exhibit unhealthy behaviors linked to cancer. I think we can all identify with her concerns because we all have people we care about that we wished lived healthier lives.
"[He] has smoked cigarettes since he was sixteen years old, which means that he has been smoking for thirty-one years. He smokes about forty cigarettes per day. He has also been a very heavy drinker for about twenty-five years. He would normally drink about a twelve pack of beer per day. And as I have mentioned before, the combination of these two increase the chance of getting cancer of the mouth, larynx, throat, esophagus, lung and liver and remember that the combination of drinking and smoking can cause cancer to develop fifteen-fold. For years I have tried to talk to him, he would get angry and say I don’t want to hear this. I would still randomly read him articles, show him pictures, and tell him information about how he can quit and that the whole family would help him."

"[She} is only twenty three years old and has been smoking for about seven years now... I have tried to talk to her many times and I have even showed her pictures of what could happen to her but all she does is get really angry, and then goes out side and smokes.... [She] smokes about ten cigarettes per day. Nothing will get through to her, not even the fact that she has a four year old son. Im so scared that she is going to get cancer, and I don’t want to lose [her] from something that could have been prevented. And in twenty years I don’t want her to never meet her grandchildren because of cancer. I hope that scientist come up with something to make smokers quit without missing it afterwards."

Powerful. Emotional.

For the expedition portion of this project, this student was asked to attend events that supported treatment of cancer. One of the events she participated in was the "Race for the Cure" Here's a brief highlight of her reflection:
"Overall, It was an emotional walk, but everyone walked with their head held high and keeping faith that one day breast cancer will never kill another mother, daughter, aunt, grandmother, lover or friend again. I’m so glad that my mama and I could experience what the walk was really about. I do plan to go again next year and I also would like to do the three day race as well."

Below is her Public Service Announcement on cancer:

HRE #9: Cardiovascular Disease Prevention

(Student project will be posted soon)

HRE #8: Cardio Designs for the Fitness Enthusiast

The purpose of this project was to research and understand the impact of cardio designs for the fitness enthusiast - someone whose lifestyle is already active, but is looking to improve fitness benefits. Below are excerpts from this project:

Fitness enthusiast or those who are in more extensive training might often use heart rate monitors to design their cardio training. Below, the student reiterates the importance of heart rate and what it means to monitor it:
"Knowing heart rate is important because you can adjust exercise to reap health benefits. Heart rate indicates the amount of stress or how many times your heart beats per minute during an activity. A person with a RHR of 45 would probably be in good to excellent physical condition so their heart doesn’t have to beat as hard to get the same volume of blood circulation. Monitoring heart rate gives you the exact bpm and the rate of perceived exertion gives a person a range but people may not feel that they are working as hard or harder. Heart rate monitors help people train in certain zones for particular benefits. I would monitor sedentary people or people with low cardio respiratory endurance over an athlete or someone with moderate endurance who knows what their body feels like at certain heart rate levels. A fitness enthusiast would probably be running or cycling because those are the most common and to keep them from getting bored I would recommend rock climbing, swimming, and one-on-one sports. Vigorous exercise means to exercise at an intensity level that is above 60%. Vigorous exercise most likely cannot be sustained for a long period of time for most people. Examples could be running, cross-training or interval training, and cross-country skiing. MET stands for metabolic equivalent and represents the rate of energy expended at rest (1 MET). Exercises are in multiples of 1 MET and depend on intensity. MET applies to fitness because it gives levels for various activities. In performance and training males are genetically predisposed with more muscle mass, which equips males to be physically stronger and faster and women"

During his expedition, the student was asked to reflect on his physiological and psychological experience as he gradually took his heart rate through his training zones:
"I went to the gym and tracked my heart rate while walking on the treadmill. At 40-50 percent I felt find and was able to breath easily. I wasn’t sweating and was able to talk fine. At 50-60 percent I began to sweat but not to where it was rolling down my face. My breathing began to get deeper but I was still able to breath out of my nose fine. At 60-75 percent I was sweating and couldn’t breathe out of my nose comfortably anymore. I could feel the burn in my legs while I was pushing up to and past 75 percent. At 75-85 percent my breathing became very heavy and I could feel my heart began to race. At 85 percent and above my breathing became very hard and my whole body began to burn trying to push through the last two minutes. I could feel my heart racing like it was ready to burst. Sustaining that was not very easy I think I quit at a minute. The cool down at 50 percent I could still feel everything from the 85 percent but my heart rate dropped very quickly. My breathing was still very hard and I couldn’t breathe through my nose comfortably for a few minutes. I still felt like I was exercising hard because I was still sweating during the cool down but my body went back to normal fairly quickly."

Because podcasting has become such a huge movement with iPods, there has been a tremendous surge in the fitness industry to provide programming in mp3 form. The student searched different fitness podcasts for cardio training and assessed their advantages and limitations:
"I searched the web looking for podcasts that were specifically designed to listen to when working out. The ones that I found were all free to use and download to your mp3 player. Once loaded to your mp3 player they are accessible at any time during your workout. I listened to demos both for cardio programs and for muscular strength and endurance and found that they weren’t very motivating for me. They sounded more like instructions rather than a tool to help you workout harder and more efficiently. I would think that the audience of these would be novices who need help but don’t know who to ask and don’t know what to do. Not to get them motivated but to give them a better understanding of what workouts they can do and how to do the correctly. I wouldn’t recommend these to anybody that has access to trainers to aid them or has another person to workout with. I would only recommend this to somebody who is training alone or at home who doesn’t have aid from anyone."

Below is the Public Service Announcement for helping fitness enthusiasts stay active and have versatility in their training.

HRE #7: Cardio designs for the Health Seeker

The purpose of this project was to understand the benefits of physical activity from a health seeker's perspective - not the physical fitness enthusiast. How does one create a cardiovascular program for the sedentary individual?

What are some aerobic activities one can engage in?
1-Stair Climbing
2-Doing your own yard work
3-Brisk Walking
4-Dancing
5-Wash your car

What is the Surgeon General's recommended guidelines for physical activity and why are they important for helping people implement activity in their lives?

Accumulate 30 minutes or more of moderate-intensity physical activity over the course of most days of the week. It is important that someone new to any form of physical activity build their program gradually so they don’t get disappointed and the can maintain it for the long run. I would just tell them what the surgeon General recommends, after they get used to physical activity then I would start implementing more specific workouts to fit their goals and wants.

Below the student reflects on his expedition where he was asked to wear a pedometer for 2 weeks and track his experience and steps on WalkerTracker.com

(1) Was it hard to keep track of your daily step count – were there days you forgot to log in?
Well it wasn’t hard keeping track of my daily step counts it was just hard remembering to log in, I made a book were I keep my steps and I write them down every night before I go to bed. I just forget to log in and post them online. Yeah I almost always forgot to log in but I did and I posted all my progress.

(2) Out of the 14 days, how many days in total did you reach 10,000 steps a day?
Out of the 14 days I only reached 10,000 steps 4 times.

(3) Do you think obtaining 10K steps a day is a reasonable activity? Do you think most people can attain this goal? If so, why aren’t people simply walking more?
Obtaining 10,000 steps a day is reasonable it’s just hard. I don’t think most people can obtain this goal, the only reason I obtained it was because ether I ran or played football with my friends.

My pedometer experience was great, I loved wearing the pedometer and people asking me hey why are you wearing that and me telling them is a project for my fitness class. I think that just by me wearing the pedometer and my friends looking at me wearing it and asking me question I helped them get a little motivated in physical activity. Now my sister and her boyfriend wear one to, they ask me all the time if I reached 10,000 steps because they haven’t done it once yet. This was just a class assignment but I’m going to continue wearing my pedometer, not only for my self but so people can ask me why are you wearing that and I can tell them to stay in shape just by walking.

Below is the student's public service announcement about increasing your daily physical activity:

(PSA post to come)

HRE #6: Body Image & Eating Disorders

(Student project will be posted soon)