Module 8:  Maintaining an Active and Healthy Lifestyle

A Healthy Lifestyle Beyond This Course

During this ActiveU course, you have been focusing on reaching the activity goals listed in the Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans document. These have included MVPA and vigorous activity goals, performing muscle-strengthening activities, and reducing your sedentary time. This module shows you a number of other health factors you can monitor to help maintain an active and healthy lifestyle.

Heart rate

How is your heart rate related to your health?

When you are at rest, your heart pumps the lowest amount of blood to supply the oxygen your body needs. For most healthy adult women and men, resting heart rates range from 60 to 90 beats per minute.

Monitoring your resting heart rate (RHR) is important because it can help provide clues about your overall heart health. For instance, a consistently high resting heart rate can be a sign that your heart isn’t working as efficiently as it could be. In some cases, it can even be a sign of an underlying heart condition.

Generally, a lower heart rate at rest implies more efficient heart function and better cardiovascular fitness. A higher resting heart rate has been linked with lower physical fitness and higher blood pressure, body weight and levels of circulating blood fats.

How does exercise affect your RHR?

Regular exercise and/or physical activity can lead to a reduction in your RHR, especially if it involves endurance training. For females, there is also some evidence that yoga or strength training can help reduce RHR.

If you are tracking your resting heart rate and see it rise, there could be several causes that aren’t related to your fitness level, including:

• Being sleep-deprived
• Dehydration or in cases of high heat and humidity
• Developing an illness or a medical condition
• Mental, emotional or physical stress

When to measure your RHR?

The American Heart Association recommends checking your resting heart rate first thing in the morning — but before you get out of bed.

Also, it is important to wait at least an hour after consuming caffeine, which can cause heart palpitations and make your heart rate rise. Do not take your RHR within two hours after exercise or a stressful event. Your heart rate can stay elevated after strenuous activities.

What is target-heart-rate training?

Exercising at different heart rates has been associated with different training benefits, and there are different “zones” that tend to produce different health outcomes.

These zones are based on your intensity level compared to your maximum heart rate, which is considered the highest amount your heart can sustain during cardiovascular training. To calculate your maximum heart rate, subtract your age from 220.

Although there are many different names for these zones, we use the following as a guide:

Your Goal?	Your heart rate zone (percentage of max)
To improve aerobic fitness	70% – 80%
To improve basic endurance                    and burn fat	60% – 70%
To improve overall health	50% – 60%

 

Maximum:  90-100%	Develops maximum performance and speed
Hard:  80-90%	Increases maximum performance capacity
Moderate:  70-80%	Improves aerobic fitness
Light:  60-70%	Improves basic endurance and fat burning
Ver Light:  50-60%	Improves overall health and helps recovery

How to monitor your heart rate

You don’t need a special device to measure your heart rate. Follow these steps to measure your heart rate (or someone else’s):

1. Take the pads/tips of your index (pointer) finger and middle finger.
2. Press them gently against the side of your neck (just under your jawline). Or press on the inside of your wrist, below the base of your thumb.
3. Count the number of beats you feel for 15 seconds. Use a stopwatch or other timing device to track the seconds accurately.
4. Multiply the number of beats by 4.
5. That number is your heart rate.

If you have a device like an Apple watch, Fitbit or Movband, they will have a sensor that measures your pulse. Some smartphone apps can use your phone’s camera to sense the pulse in your finger.

While these are not perfect, they do provide good estimates. These devices include  automatic timing and tracking heart rate over time to show changes or trends.

 Blood Pressure

How is your blood pressure related to your health?

When your heart pumps blood through the arteries, that blood puts pressure on the artery walls. This pressure caused by your heart pumping and relaxing is known as blood pressure.

Blood pressure is measured using an inflatable cuff that is wrapped around your arm. The cuff is inflated and then the air is slowly let out of the cuff. A blood pressure reading will include two numbers. The first is your systolic pressure, which is measured after the heart contracts and is the higher number. The second is your diastolic pressure, which is measured before the heart contracts and is the lower number.

Know Your Numbers

The American Heart Association identifies five ranges of blood pressure.  As you can see, it is important to examine both your systolic and diastolic scores.

Blood Pressure Category	Systolic mm Hg (upper number)	And/or	Diastolic mm Hg (lower Number)
Normal	Less than 120	And	Less than 80
Elevated	120-129	And	Less than 80
Hight Blood Pressure (Hypertension) Stage I	130-139	Or	80-90
High Blood Pressure	40 or Higher	Or	90 or higher
Hypertensive Crisis (consult your doctor)	Higher than 180	And/or	Highter than 120

The higher your blood pressure levels, the more risk you have for other health problems, such as heart disease, heart attack and stroke.

How Does Exercise Affect Your Blood Pressure?

Regular physical activity makes your heart stronger, and a stronger heart can pump more blood with less effort. Exercise can also reduce blood vessel stiffness so blood can flow more easily.

As a result, the force on your arteries decreases, lowering your blood pressure. Becoming more active can lower both your top and bottom blood pressure numbers.

Regular exercise also helps you maintain a healthy weight, which is another important way to control blood pressure. If you’re overweight, losing even five pounds can lower your blood pressure.

Best exercise for maintaining or reducing blood pressure

The best exercises to develop a healthy heart are those that belong in the aerobic exercise category. From Module 1, you will recall that the term aerobic means “with oxygen.” This is the exercise group that includes larger muscle activities such as brisk walking, running and swimming laps.

The effects of exercise are most noticeable during and immediately after a workout. Lowered blood pressure can be most significant right after you work out. As a result, an ideal way to manage your blood pressure might be to break up your workout into several sessions throughout the day. Options can include 10 minutes of brisk or moderate walking, or perhaps 10 minutes of cycling or pedal pushing, three times a day.

When to measure your blood pressure

Blood pressure can change throughout the day, so you should try to measure your blood pressure at about the same time each day.

You are most likely to get an accurate reading if you are in a quiet room and you are comfortable. It’s also a good idea to have rested for five to 10 minutes. While taking your blood pressure, you should be seated with both feet flat on the floor. In addition, there are certain factors that can cause blood pressure to temporarily rise. These include stress, smoking, cold temperatures, exercise, caffeine and certain medicines. Try to avoid as many of these factors as you can when taking your blood pressure.

How you can monitor your blood pressure

You can get your blood pressure measured in a number of ways.

At a doctor’s office, a health care team member will usually wrap an inflatable cuff around your arm, and then will inflate the cuff, which gently tightens on your arm. The cuff has a gauge on it that will measure your blood pressure.

Many pharmacies have a digital blood pressure measurement kiosk where you can sit quietly and slide your arm into a cuff. Full instructions are written on the kiosk and your BP measure will display on a screen.

You can also purchase a home blood pressure monitor that you can use yourself. These are excellent ways of staying on top of your health, especially if you have a condition that requires regular blood pressure readings. The best monitors give accurate readings, are easy to use and aren’t complicated to fit around your arm.

It is important to remember that The American Heart Association recommends an automatic, cuff-style, bicep (upper arm) monitor. They do not recommend wrist and finger monitors because they yield less reliable readings.

Sleep

How is sleep related to your health?

As a college student, you live a hectic life with countless commitments. For many students, the one aspect of their day that most often gets compromised is sleep. As an example, while most adults need up to 8 hours of sleep each night to feel well rested and alert throughout the day, college students average closer to 6 hours. Further, about 3 in 4 students report having sleep problems.

Types of sleep

Traditionally, sleep has been divided into four categories — awake, light, deep and REM (rapid eye movement) sleep. Each plays an important role in your mental and physical health. www.ouraring.com/blog/sleep-stages/

Awake time

Time spent in bed before and after falling asleep.

Light sleep

Guides you into deeper sleep stages

• muscles relax, heart rate slows, body temperature drops

Deep sleep

Focuses on restoring your body

• blood pressure drops, body promotes muscle and
  tissue growth and repair

REM sleep

Re-energizes your mind

• breathing and heart rate increase, vivid dreams,
  benefits for memory, learning and problem solving

Tips for better sleep

While many college students do not get the recommended amount of sleep per night, it is not just the quantity of sleep that is important.

 Sleep quality is defined by a number of characteristics. Among these are:

• Falling asleep soon after getting into bed, within 30 minutes or less.
• Sleeping through the night, only waking once per night
• Falling back asleep within 20 minutes if you do wake up
• Feeling rested and energized upon waking up in the morning.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention lists a number of tips for getting a good night’s sleep. They call this sleep hygiene, as it is about practicing good habits.

• Be consistent. Go to bed at the same time each night and get up at the same time each morning, including on the weekends
• Make sure your bedroom is quiet, dark, relaxing and at a comfortable temperature
• Remove electronic devices, such as TVs, computers and smart phones, from the bedroom
• Avoid large meals, caffeine and alcohol before bedtime
• Get some exercise. Being physically active during the day can help you fall asleep more easily at night

Why You Need Sleep

Sleep gives your body and brain time to recover from the stresses of the day. During sleep, your brain is preparing for the next day. It is forming new pathways to help you learn and remember information. Whether you’re learning calculus, how to play an instrument, how to perfect your golf swing or how to operate new machinery, sleep helps enhance your learning and problem-solving skills.

Sleep, then, is necessary to protect your mental health, physical health, quality of life and safety. Without enough sleep, your brain struggles to perform basic functions and you may find it hard to concentrate or remember things or become moody and lash out at co-workers or people you love

Sleep and your physical health

Virtually all bodily systems are negatively affected by poor or insufficient sleep. Sleep is involved in healing and the repair of your heart and blood vessels. Repeated lack of sleep is linked to an increased risk of heart disease, kidney disease, high blood pressure, diabetes  and stroke.

Sleep deficiency also increases the risk of obesity, with each hour of sleep lost increasing the odds. Sleep helps maintain a healthy balance of the hormones that make you feel hungry (ghrelin) or full (leptin). When you don’t get enough sleep, your level of ghrelin goes up and your level of leptin goes down. This makes you feel hungrier than when you’re well-rested.

Sleep is also related to how your body reacts to insulin, the hormone that controls your blood glucose (sugar) level. Insufficient sleep results in a higher than normal blood sugar level, which may increase your risk for diabetes.

Your immune system relies on sleep to stay healthy, and continuous lack of enough sleep can change the way your immune system responds. People who are sleep-deficient may have trouble fighting common infections.

When Your Sleep Quality Is Poor

Several negative outcomes can occur when your sleep quality is poor. First, you are less productive at school and work. You take longer to finish tasks, have a slower reaction time and make more mistakes.

You may also experience microsleep, brief moments of sleep that occur when you are awake. Think of times during a class where you felt like you missed some of the information or you didn’t understand the main point. In reality, you may have slept through this section of the class and not been aware of it.

Microsleep can occur anytime you are sleep deprived. Missing a small part of a class can have consequences on an individual level, but if microsleep occurs at the wrong time, particularly in high-stakes situations that require high levels of alertness and quick reaction times, such as driving, the results can be tragic.

How does exercise affect your sleep?

While there is solid evidence that exercise helps you fall asleep more quickly and improves sleep quality, researchers don’t completely understand how physical activity improves sleep.

What is known is that 30 minutes of exercise may enhance sleep quality that same night. Exercise can also help reduce sleep onset (the time it takes to fall asleep) and also decreases the amount of time you lie awake in bed during the night.

The reason is that this moderate aerobic exercise can increase the amount of slow wave sleep you get. Slow wave sleep occurs mostly during deep sleep, that time when your brain and body have a chance to rejuvenate.

When and where to exercise to help your sleep

As you prepare to sleep, your body temperature drops, your heart rate slows and your brain waves get slower. Exercise, on the other hand, leads to a rise in core body temperature, an increased heart rate and higher levels of arousal — none of which are favorable to sleep. It is not surprising then that for many years, experts advised against exercising before bed.

However, current research suggests there is no specific time of day that is best to exercise for sleep. It is more important to avoid vigorous exercise within one hour of bedtime, as this intensity does not allow time for core body temperature to cool. You may need to experiment to find an exercise schedule that works for you.

Timely exposure to bright light can help improve sleep quality. Exercising outdoors helps align your body’s natural internal clock with sunlight. When your circadian rhythm is in sync with natural light, you tend to feel alert during the day and tired at night, which can help improve your sleep quality.

How you can monitor your sleep

A number of new technologies can help people evaluate their sleep quality.  Many wearable devices include sleep trackers that measure your sleep effectiveness and identify disruptions during the night in your breathing, temperature and heart rate. The trackers record and then translate this data into simple but insightful reports, complete with recommendations to get a better night’s rest.

Also available are sleep tracking pads that sit under your mattress and monitor your heart rate, track sleep, observe your respiratory rate and track your body movements during the night. Each of these has an associated app that provides you with customized sleep information so you can easily assess your sleep health over time.

Use a device to monitor your sleep: Wear a wristband device while you sleep and your sleep data will be collected
and displayed for you to monitor over time.

References

Dolezal, B. A., Neufeld, E. V., Boland, D. M., Martin, J. L., & Cooper, C. B. (2017). Interrelationship between sleep and exercise: A systematic review. Advances in Preventive Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1155/2017/5979510

You have reached the end of Module 8. Please complete the Assessment.