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              Thanks to timtinman for permission to use this Photo.                 

Even though you massage only one body part at a time, it’s critical that you keep the body’s “wholeness” in mind.  The book explains this concept well.  For example, when someone has a headache, you know that they will benefit from a head massage.  That’s obvious.  But if you have a good understanding of the body’s wholeness, you’ll know that you need to massage the neck and shoulders as well.  As we’ve discussed in previous lessons, it’s all connected.  Everything!  I know you’ll be absolutely amazed as you begin to experience for yourself the interconnectedness of bodily regions and parts.   

You’ll probably find that the majority of the massages you give focus on relaxing the neck or back.  These are the two most common “problem areas.”  Both of these regions affect posture, which can be dramatically improved with massage.  I’m sure you know someone who spends a good part of the day sitting hunched over a computer or desk.  Prolonged sitting with a forward head position is by far the most common cause for bad posture.  Again, consider the body’s wholeness.  Work the neck and back, but don’t forget about the chest.  By loosening up the chest and the front of the shoulders, you can “open up” the upper body, bringing shoulders and neck back into proper positioning.  Stretch the neck, shoulders, and chest on a regular basis, and you will improve posture. 

Kristy Carter
Massage Techniques Program Instructor
Ashworth University

These days, with an estimated 60% of the US population being overweight, it seems as if everyone is trying to lose weight. When I ask my friends about strategies for shedding pounds and healthy living, most of them say, “I don’t eat bread, sugar, rice, or pasta. I’m cutting back on the carbs.”   

Weight loss occurs when you consume fewer calories than what you burn off during the day. So should you cut out carbs to lose weight? Hmmm…It depends on which dietary sources of carbohydrates you eat. Carbohydrates are your body’s main source of energy so trying to cut them out completely is unhealthy. Carbohydrates are found in grains, fruit, vegetables, most dairy products, and sugary desserts. Most foods that are good for you contain carbohydrates and are fundamental to a healthy diet.  

So what carbohydrates should you take out of your diet? Cut carbohydrates that add extra calories with little or no nutritional value.  These include candy, soda, sugary desserts, and fruit drinks. Drinks that contain 100% juice have some nutritive value. Fruit drinks that are made with mostly sugar and water, such as Kool-Aid or Hawaiian Punch contain little nutritional value and add empty calories that should be avoided if you’re trying to lose weight.  

So go ahead, eat your whole grain bread, brown rice, and whole wheat pasta without guilt! Most foods that contain carbohydrates are important sources of vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Carbohydrates do not make you gain weight. Overeating and lack of exercise does.

Carla Hardy MS, CSCS
Fitness and Exercise Instructor
Ashworth University

Let’s face it, not everyone is an effective communicator.  Some people are more reserved and must put forth a great deal of effort to be sociable and interact with others on a daily basis.  For other people, it’s not difficult at all to put on a smile, chat with, and listen to others. And although sometimes it’s tough to listen to the problems of others, especially when we’re distracted by our own troubles, the bottom line is that as health care workers, our own needs and desires take a back seat to those of our patients.  Put yourself in their shoes:  When we’re not feeling well, or must have a procedure performed, we certainly don’t want to encounter a grumpy, rude, or disinterested medical office employee.  We want to be considered important, and we want to be able to interact  with caring medical staff members who act as though they truly are concerned with our well-being.  Therefore, as a medical assistant, it is imperative that you keep your own expectations and requirements in mind when you are dealing with patients.  Remember, you represent the physicians and the entire office staff.  The attention and impression you give will improve or detract from the quality of the patient’s encounter, as well as the overall success of the health-care facility.

As the key link between the office and the patient, you must learn to give patients the individual care that they require and deserve.  You must learn to assess a patient’s needs quickly so that you can address their problems and concerns effectively. Part of this process is being able to tailor your response to each individual.  For example, you certainly would not communicate with a sick child the same way you communicate with an 80-year-old patient.  Think about how would you deal with a patient who speaks little or no English.  Would you greet a patient coming to the office for an immunization shot differently than you would treat a patient coming in to be treated for HIV?  Throughout your Medical Office Assisting program, we’ll consider the answers to these critical questions.

In learning how to individualize your approach to helping each patient, you will also learn about Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs in this program.  As well as being able to assess the needs of a patient, you must also understand how those needs can be met.  To determine this, you must decide where you perceive those needs falls in the hierarchy of needs.  Maslow believed that basic, physiological needs must be met before higher goals can be reached.  For example, if a patient is homeless, his primary concern will be that he has something to eat and a place to sleep tonight, not that his blood pressure is elevated and he may have a stroke someday.

With respect to terminally ill patients, we will focus a lot on Elisabeth Kubler-Ross’s five Stages of Dying.  You should take note of her highly insightful theories.  The chances are very good that you will at some point manage patients who are terminally ill (these five stages also apply to patients suffering from grief).  Knowing the emotional state of the patient makes empathy and communication easier.  The stages also explain why a patient might be cooperative and pleasant one day and angry and combative another day. 

Remember, it’s a privilege to work in a medical office.  I never take this privilege for granted and encourage you to demonstrate the same kind of pride when dealing with your patients.  At the end of the day, we’re here for the patients and are held to standards of excellence that should never be compromised.

John E. Long
Medical Office Assisting Program Instructor
Ashworth University School of Health Care

From Hannah Waight of Experience:

No longer is healthcare confined to doctors and nurses - now more than ever jobs are available for people with all types of interests within this highly diverse industry. Although you may not look forward to that trip to the dentist or those yearly shots from the doctor, no one can deny that healthcare is an essential aspect of all of our lives.  People who are willing and able to work in the health industry will always be in demand.  In fact, healthcare has long been one of the biggest industries in the nation, and now, because of the aging population of the United States and advances in medical technology, the need for qualified workers is only going to increase.  Your ideal job is within your grasp as long as you have the appropriate background and inside information.

As an industry, healthcare offers a diverse range of jobs for many different types of people.  You can work in the traditional health provision sector as a doctor or nurse, or in a wide variety of medical fields.  Preventative medicine and recovery is getting increasing attention from insurance companies looking to keep their costs down: dietitians, counselors, and physical therapists all play key roles in keeping people healthy. Research in academic medicine and biotechnology provides opportunities for professionals interested in discovering the next generation of treatment.  The people- and paperwork-oriented are needed to run the business and administrative side of the industry.

Copyright © 1996 - 2008 Experience, Inc. - All Rights Reserved

To read more of Hannah’s great article, login to the Ashworth University Career Center through the student portal and click here.

Ryan Rode
Interactive Services Manager
Ashworth University

Photo courtesy of Jo Guldi

It is truly alarming the number of people around the world who are overweight these days, and it is really no wonder. After all, we as a people have become so lazy and so dependent on sugary, fatty foods and beverages. There are also other reasons why people are overweight however, such as to control their emotions or make themselves feel better. Emotional eating is perhaps one of the most dangerous problems in terms of your weight, especially if you live a very emotional or hectic life.

Sometimes the strongest longings for food happen when you are at your weakest point emotionally. If you are sad or lonely, angry or depressed, you may notice that you begin craving certain foods, perhaps some of which you never even really considered before. Eating as a way to suppress your feelings, such as stress, anxiety, boredom and even confusion, can really sabotage your weight loss efforts. The good news is that if you are someone who is prone to emotional eating, there are things that you can do to get over these habits and get back to eating healthy and looking and feeling your very best.

Find the Problem

It is important that you take the time to try and determine the actual root cause of your emotional eating. Sure you know that you are eating as a way to help yourself deal through the tough times, but there must be a more significant underlying cause. Major live events such as unemployment and health problems, for instance, may have triggered the onset of your emotional eating problem and this is what you are going to have to deal with.

Also know that there are certain foods which seem to have particularly addictive qualities. These are the foods that most people tend to crave when they are down or upset, and which you should be especially careful with. This includes chocolate and candy, and when you eat these foods what happens is that your body releases trace amounts of mood hormones which is why the foods seem like a sort of reward, because you think that they are making you feel better. They may help temporarily to relieve the feelings of tension or stress that you are experiencing, but even just a few moments after you eat them you will feel even worse than you did to begin with. (more…)

              Thanks to Lee Gillen for permission to use this Photo.

A recent episode of 60 Minutes featured a timely report on the possible link between lack of sleep and obesity.  I describe the report as timely because it’s been widely documented that human beings are getting less sleep than ever, a particularly troubling fact when you consider that we’re also working more intensive schedules, and balancing this imbalance with drive through diet practices.  The resultant obesity effect is simply another in a long line of health problems related to sleep deprivation; the most dangerous being heart disease and diabetes.  Alright, so this isn’t the sunniest subject to discuss at the dinner table, but it’s a dialogue that must begin between families if this crisis is to be scaled back before reaching the epidemic stage.  Check out the following “Science Of Sleep” video to learn more about the implications of your potentially harmful sleep patterns.  Go to bed early tonight!  Take a nap tomorrow!

Ryan Rode
Interactive Services Manager
Ashworth University Health Care Program

Photo courtesy of sarah

I am visiting GMU. Yesterday, as I was answering email, I heard a class in progress on the other side of the partition by my desk. It was Robin Hanson lecturing about the economics of health care to 20 undergraduates. It was so interesting I ended up listening to about 90 minutes of it. “Do your students know what a great class they’re getting?” I asked Robin during a break. “I don’t know myself,” Robin replied.

I have heard hundreds of professors lecture. I had never heard anything like this. It wasn’t the usual stuff. It wasn’t the usual stuff made entertaining with cartoons or demonstrations or jokes or war stories. Instead, it was a straightforward look at how the medical profession operates, and a lot of it was about how it operates to empower doctors, reduce the power of patients, and reduce health care innovation. Robin traced the history of the profession from the 1800s until today. “What separates a trade from a profession?” he asked his class. Professionals have ethics, he said. Doctors devised a code of ethics. At the top was “first, do no harm.” What does this mean in practice, he asked his class. If a patient dies, does the doctor feel shame? No. If a patient wants a medical procedure that isn’t recommended, does this mean the doctor doesn’t do it? Apparently not. In contrast to the remarkable vagueness of “first do no harm” the rest of the doctors’ ethics code was quite clear: no practice without a license, no advertising, and so on — each item with clear economic implications.

Robin also discussed how little doctors are supervised. A British doctor managed to kill over 200 people before anyone noticed; he was finally caught only because he forged a will. A nurse at a local hospital was assigned measure how often doctors wash their hands. They’re supposed to always wash their hands but many do not. The nurse did the survey, and, as requested, correlated hand washing compliance with death rates. It turned out that the doctor who washed his hands the least had the highest death rate. The nurse reported this. The exceptional doctor had her fired. (more…)

           Thanks to Monica Semergiu for permission to use this Photo.

Experience has taught me that it really doesn’t matter how rational, educated, or seemingly healthy a person is—any one of us is susceptible to “chasing dragons” in search of that instant and painless answer to our problems.  Consider the aggressive expansion of an already billion dollar weight loss industry into younger and younger market sectors for additional proof.  Not quite as sinister, but perhaps more humorous is the following weight loss video by British hypnotist, Paul McKenna.  By blindfolding his study participants as they eat, McKenna is attempting to creatively demonstrate the often argued relationship between what we see and how much we actually desire to eat.  I’m not sure that this experiment is revelatory in any sense, but there are some interesting implications to consider regarding the role of visual perception, craving, and consumption.  Check out this video and let us know what’s the strangest weight loss method you’ve ever tried…

Ryan Rode
Interactive Services Manager
Ashworth University

             Thanks to freeparking for permission to use this Photo.

There are many physiological changes that occur in a woman’s body and in the fetus during pregnancy. Many of these changes create a need for more nutrients. By being well informed of her options, a pregnant woman can meet her own nutritional needs and those of her baby. The bottom line is that proper nutrition plays a major role in reducing health risks during pregnancy. You’ll discover, too, that a woman’s nutritional needs post-partum (after the separation of birth) may actually be greater than they were during pregnancy.

With her doctor’s approval, a woman can and should engage in regular physical activity during the months when she is expecting. A friend of mine was marking chalk lines on softball fields the day before she gave birth, and another was teaching aerobics right up to her ninth month. The difference between an active, healthy pregnancy and one marked by serious health concerns may well be the woman’s overall nutritional status. Is her normal diet providing all the nutrients a healthy woman needs? Is she a smoker? Does she consume alcohol? Is illegal drug use threatening the future health of mother and child?

Pregnancy brings a whole new set of worries to all women, no matter how healthy and active they have been. While some health risks are unavoidable because they are hereditary or simply unforeseen, the nutritional status of most women is largely within their control. For instance, the majority of women in America appear to make conscious choices about what they eat and drink. However, it’s also their choice whether or not to drink alcohol, smoke cigarettes, or take illegal drugs. If women choose a healthy diet and lifestyle, they shouldn’t have to worry about the effects of poor nutrition and unhealthy personal habits when they become pregnant.

Moderate physical activity has many benefits for a pregnant woman. For example, mild walking will help tone the mother’s muscles and will not put stress on her body or the growing fetus. However, experts recommend that someone who hasn’t been exercising prior to pregnancy should not begin a vigorous exercise routine on her own once she learns she’s expecting. Her growing baby has enough adaptations to make without also having to adapt to unaccustomed exercise. The general rule is this: Before beginning any strenuous exercise program, a pregnant woman should consult her physician to make sure her exercise plan is appropriate to her physical condition. (more…)

           Thanks to catnipintoxicating for permission to use this Photo.

To estimate your daily calorie requirement, you can follow these steps:

• Estimate your resting metabolic rate, the amount of calories you need simply to breathe, pump blood, and be alive, by multiplying your healthy weight by 10 calories per pound.  If you are significantly overweight, use an adjusted weight halfway between your current weight and desired weight.
• Add more calories for daily activity apart from your purposeful exercise.
• Add more calories for purposeful exercise.
• To lose weight, subtract 20 percent of your total calories needs.

Carla Hardy MS, CSCS
Fitness and Exercise Instructor
Ashworth University