It's finally here -- the long awaited 2022 edition of the acclaimed text How to Be a Health Coach: An Integrative Wellness Approach, Second Edition, used in over 100 schools and training programs and in several countries. A comprehensive educational text for health coaching:

• Over 320 pages of updated models, guidance, theoretical frameworks, process skills and coaching tasks that are vitally important for professional health coaches.
• New guide sheet of healthy lifestyle information for preventing chronic disease.
• Presents step-by-step guidance for the tackling the skills and knowledge outlined by the National Board for Health & Wellness Coaching (NBHWC) including scope of practice, ethical standards and professional practice--lots of solid preparation for taking the National Certification exam.
• Templates for intake sessions, initial meetings, ongoing sessions, motivational interviewing sessions, and for closing the coaching relationship. Includes coaching agreements, several types of Wellness Wheels for your use with clients.
• Offers first-time, cutting-edge tips for addressing diversity, equity and inclusion for health coaches.
• Advance your coaching knowledge and techniques with the latest information and research on the neurobiology of behavior change, stress physiology, emotional and social intelligence, Nonviolent Communication, mindfulness and dozens of holistic practices for improving self-awareness and self-efficacy.
• GROUP coaching guidelines, updated and resourceful
• Fully indexed (improved index!)

Includes important contemporary issues that make coaching inclusive and integrative. 
James and Janice Prochaska, authors of Changing to Thrive 
Conveys essential skills and knowledge for an outstanding curriculum.  
Michael Arloski, Masterful Health and Wellness Coaching
Meg embodies the heart and soul of the health coaching world. Magnificent!  
Nancy Gillette, MA,  Executive Coach, Adaptive Exercise Specialist

Jordan, M. A. (2021). The Role of the Health Coach in a Global Pandemic. Global Advances in Health and Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1177/21649561211039456

As the co-morbidities and other chronic conditions related to COVID-19 among individuals and families in low income communities are worsened by dual forces (lifestyle/behavioral choices and ingrained structural inequities), adding the support of certified health coaches to build trust, provide more convenient access to address vaccine hesitancy, and dispel falsehoods, is an effective means for advancing health and wellbeing. Group coaching and one-on-one coaching can work in tandem with public health initiatives for reducing chronic disease burden and addressing social determinants of health (SDoH). Skills are identified in coaching SDoH with expanded cultural competencies for health coaches.

​Conclusion: Certified professional health coaches can make a positive impact on general risk reduction of chronic diseases within ethnic/racial minorities, thereby supporting population health in facing future contagions with greater health resilience.

 I served on one of first vaccination teams in December at a SNF with an active COVID outbreak, setting up the mobile clinic in an outdoor courtyard, on a chilly day. We took no breaks because we didn’t want to don and doff our PPE--a feat of endurance. We set up four stations: registration/counseling,  vaccination tables, recovery area. I noted how smoothly my RN colleagues, all former or current ICU or ER nurses like myself, moved into action together, even though we never met till that morning. It was a familiar, no-nonsense rhythm of providing what was critically needed, and a welcomed break from the social-political obsessions I experienced most days of 2020.

When the public health official arrived with the refrigerated case of Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, we gathered around to open it. Wow. We beheld the rows of tiny purple-capped vials, and a wave of emotion swept over the entire team. Maybe because these were among the first vaccines to arrive in Marin County, maybe because it was the day before Christmas Eve, and we were huddled together in a SNF courtyard strung with paper Christmas decorations, but there was no denying that we felt like something precious and rare and long sought after was in our hands. It was viewed as a very privileged and sacred moment, a chance to end this epidemic of sickness, death and loneliness. I gingerly picked up one vial with a double gloved hand and joked, “Look at us, we look like we’re gazing at baby Jesus, as if a Christmas miracle had arrived!” And true to form, we burst out laughing, a typical response of front-line health care personnel to break the tension and get back to work. 

You might wonder if we were there to vaccinate the frail elderly residents.  No, just the staff. California follows the CDC recommendations to first vaccinate the most at-risk which aren’t the non-ambulatory residents, but the staff—the nursing aids, orderlies, cooks, cleaners and janitors of nursing homes and SNFs. These folks are often new immigrants, people of color with higher rates of chronic disease, who work for low wages due to minimal education or lack of documentation. They work hard holding onto the only job they could get without specialized credentials, and they do their best in the poorest of conditions. They are most at-risk from an epidemiological viewpoint, taking public transit back and forth to crowded living conditions, frequenting stores or working extra shifts at essential service jobs, in contact with hundreds of people each week, and also going room to room at the SNF, sometimes in more than one facility.

But it wasn’t always easy to convince staff to get the shot. While a few gladly rolled up a sleeve, several heard about a “lack of testing” or that “it gives you the disease.” We had to listen patiently, try to dispel fears and misinformation. Once a threshold of staff started lining up, the tide was turned and we jabbed away. While most people I talk with are thrilled to know that the vaccine is available for everyone, there are still those who are fearful or hesitant, and in those cases, I offer this moment of mindful reframing. Consider transmuting that worry with the current fact-based reality, that the world is participating in a massive coordination to bring a remarkable vaccines everywhere…the culmination of the work of thousands--scientists, virologists, clinical investigators, immunologists, epidemiologists, refrigerant engineers, delivery and dissemination experts, independent medical advisory boards, government and private enterprise partners, dedicated public servants, extraordinary public health leaders—and it is amazing that it winds up in the hands of volunteers like me willing to reach out and ask you to roll up your sleeve for a healthier, safer, happier world than what we’ve experienced since the start of 2021.

Gathering a Movement Together

Dunn’s lectures and writings inspired Bill Hetter, MD, to gather like-minded individuals to establish the National Wellness Institute (NWI) in 1977.  He created a six dimensional model of wellness3, while John Travis, MD, MPH, who called himself a “recovering allopath,” developed an Illness-Wellness Continuum that conceptualized optimal health as a dynamic and flexible choice on the spectrum from health to illness4. These tools facilitated the mission of NWI to serve the professionals and organizations that promote optimal health and wellness in individuals and communities. For over 40 years, NWI’s annual summer conference served as the wellspring transforming the movement into a profession. 
That transition was further fueled by a journal begun by Betty Neilson, EdD, who founded the journal Health Values and helped launch health promotion and wellness as an academic discipline. The journal later morphed into the American Journal of Health Promotion, replete with peer-reviewed research, the enduring legacy of Editor Michael O’Donnell. Other pioneers such as Anne Abbott moved wellness concepts into cardiac rehabilitation while wellness philosopher Don Ardell inspired with indefatigable writings about REAL (reason, exuberance, athleticism and liberty) wellness and a second version of High-Level Wellness, giving credit to Dunn.5
Thousands of wellness careers are launched at the National Wellness Conference each summer, as participants gather for both personal rejuvenation and professional advancement. Fitness trainers, exercise leaders, health coaches, teachers, doctors, nurses, and nutritionists work in collaboration by providing quality resources, workshops, continuing education trainings, and professional development programs. The annual conference (June 27-29, 2016 in St. Paul, MN) is the largest single gathering of health and wellness coaches in the nation and brings together thought leaders on worksite health promotion, integrative health, multicultural competencies, and school-based wellness. 

Expanding Number of Roles 

In my role as Co-President of the NWI board of directors, I can see that 2016 may well be a watershed year for wellness. The market for wellness products and services is estimated to be $3.4 billion industry, according to Global Wellness Institute.6 There are wellness labels on everything form dog food to medical marijuana therapies to the “WellnessMat” I’m standing on to write this article.  This explosive growth in products and services has some critics urging that we drop the name wellness for well-being, and cleanse the trend of over-commodification. However, free markets will always attract commercial enterprises. I imagine the same would happen to a “well-being movement.” 

Many allied health professionals seek to shift from a more narrowly focused career to encompass a broader vision of wellness, and they are in good company. Consider how millions of individuals could easily identify as wellness professionals: licensed health care providers, health educators, active lifestyle advocates, researchers, nutritionists, fitness trainers, group exercise leaders, natural health writers/bloggers, public health policymakers, wellness program directors and staff, health promotion and allied medical academics, physical education specialists, wellness program specialists, business leaders, HR personnel and benefits staff dedicated to wellness programming, fitness studios and health club staff, whole food activists, parks and recreational staff, even fitness technology and digital wearable entrepreneurs. One would think we could overcome any health crisis society faces in regards to lifestyle-induced chronic disease. 

However, the unchecked rise in type 2 diabetes, obesity, elevated stress, and other chronic diseases in large segments of the population is supported by longitudinal studies that show three risk factors (current smoking, overweight/obesity and physical inactivity) persist as those chiefly responsible for poor health and premature death.  According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) a healthy lifestyle remains one of the foremost ways to halt and reverse these trends.7  Health and wellness coaches specialize in just that.

Legions of Wellness Coaches

The wellness profession now boasts over 30,000 wellness and health coaches, dedicated to facilitating lifestyle improvement. Organized to advance this profession, the National Consortium for Credentialing Health and Wellness Coaches (NCCWC) reports that scores of wellness and health coach training programs have emerged in the past 18 months, many of them applying NCCHWC’s newly published standards for education and training.8 An NCCHWC national certification exam is expected in late 2016. A job task analysis conducted by NCCHWC identified 21 tasks routinely performed by coaches; the list was then sent to over 4000 working health coaches, supporting the frequency and importance of those tasks. With a consensus-built definition of health and wellness coaching, valid research methods can proceed. 

One new study found that bringing health coaches to the workplace has positive impact on employees with chronic disease, along with alleviating disengagement burnout, and improving job self-efficacy, resilience, and personal well-being for individuals managing chronic illness.9  The original pioneers who hoped to simply inspire people to lead healthier lives probably never predicted the inordinate stresses of our digital workplaces today, nor the challenges with built environments, or that Big Food would threaten health as much as Big Tobacco has. If the wellness movement was to turnaround more lives, it needed to get better organized. Entering the workplace was, and continues to be one strategy. 

Wellness in the Workplace
The first forays into workplace wellness are recalled as the golden era, in which companies such as Xerox, Travelers, and Campbell Soup Company, invested heavily in employee health with onsite fitness studios and comprehensive programs. Skyrocketing increases in health insurance rates in the ‘80s and ‘90s threatened to bring U.S.-based business to its knees, leaving economists wondering if it would ever regain a competitive edge in increasingly global markets. Unfortunately, many of these well funded and impressive worksite programs were dropped in an era of cost-containment, giving way to a second phase in 2000s, which found wellness programming shifting to human resources and benefits personnel. These managers are challenged with parceling out wellness services to a host of external vendors. Sometimes this results in a fragmented and piecemeal approach with too many short-sighted and poorly designed programs, critiqued in a meta-analysis that led to recommendations for critical components. 
An exhaustive evaluation of worksite health programs, discovered a wide variance in quality and led to recommendations for critical components to be present for effectiveness programs.10 Lively and sometimes disruptive debates stormed through the Internet, dismissing the much-quoted 3:1 ratio of benefit to cost as inaccurate or overreaching. (For every dollar invested in a wellness program, companies can reap three times that in health cost savings.) A RAND report appeared in 2013, revealing that 92% of businesses still attempt to offer some type of wellness programming (mostly for exercise and weight loss) but actual participation rates were as low as 2-10%. 11 The report could not identify with certainty if this low participation was correlated with program intensity.

With fewer “touch points,” a concept developed by Human Resources Institute leader Judd Allen for building support and connection for wellness, how could underfunded programs expect to communicate, motivate and sustain participation? The questionable benefit of programs with exceedingly low participation launched the current third phase of worksite wellness programming, which focuses on building a culture of engagement. Companies like Patagonia and Safeway discovered that an engaged culture of well-being could effectively be supported by authentic leadership. Expand beyond wellness. Address the total employee experience. It’s an approach championed by authors Rosie Ward, Jonathan Robinson and Laura Putnam, who interviewed many executives about what works for them.12, 13 Executives didn’t need to just buy-in to a well culture, they need to be role models, too. Some effective new tools to measure engagement and culture are available now, such as the Denisen Organizational Culture survey and the Gallup Q`12 Employee Engagement Survey.  

Addressing the need to rethink how we offer workplace wellness, leading nonprofit organizations offered rigorous new educational, seminars. NWI offers two certifications for specialists and program managers. International Association of Worksite Health Promotion leader George Pfeiffer is convening a forum on healthy worksite with the CDC. The International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans is looking at synergies among these groups to advance wellness professionals. 
For several decades, wellness programming focused on individual choice and action.  The conventional wellness program was designed to integrate tobacco cessation, consistent physical activity, healthy diet/nutrition promotion, stress management, early detection and screening, weight management, regular health care and proactive chronic disease management. This still makes sense today since three lifestyle behaviors (poor nutrition, physical inactivity, and tobacco use) account for 75% of chronic disease (including 80% of heart disease, stroke, and diabetes as well as 40% of cancers). In addition, roughly 75% of all medical spending, including 96% of Medicare and 83% of Medicaid spending, is spent on individuals with chronic disease.14 Wellness in the workplace can not be separated from risk reduction counseling for high risk employees. Well-conducted randomized trials suggest those opportunities need to be crucial part of effective worksite health promotion programs.

From the Individual to the Collective and Back Again

While risk factors place the onus of healthy behavior change upon the individual, new research reinforces how the social determinants of health often overcome an individual’s autonomy and disproportionately burden diverse populations. Societal factors like the built environment can help or hinder the capacity and resources for individuals, families or groups to make and sustain healthy changes. These include environmental and social policies of municipalities, the creation of safe public spaces, parks and recreational areas, the presence or absence of healthy food choices (e.g., food desserts), the incidence of neighborhood and domestic violence, the availability of educational opportunities, racial/ethnic/gender discrimination, rates of employment and socio-economic levels. 

While the rallying cry of wellness may still have the ring of Nike’s “Just do it” slogan, the harsh realities of downstream consequences resulting from short-sighted and biased upstream decisions and policies can derail the best of wellness efforts. In short, wellness professionals have learned that the actual making and sustaining of a healthy lifestyle requires a two-pronged approach of individual commitment amidst proactive, ongoing community and cultural support. That includes sensitivity to multicultural diversity and honoring and inclusion of voices from diverse backgrounds.   

Wellness can never be summed up as risk factor reduction or a collection of strategies for preventive health.  It’s much larger than that. It’s a day-to-day choice, an active process of increasing self-awareness, and community-supported self-directed, holistic action. Wellness is multidimensional, positive, and affirming. Its ground of being starts with providing loving and secure upbringings for children, along with a flourishing environment throughout the entire lifespan. Its reach extends to physical, social, emotional, mental, occupational and environmental dimensions. What makes wellness work? I like to quote John Travis, “The currency of wellness is connection.”14 We are only as well as our connections supporting each other’s optimal health and well-being.

About the Author
Meg Jordan, PhD, RN, CWP, is AF Editor in Chief, Co-President of the National Wellness Institute Board of Directors, Professor and Chair of Integrative Health Studies, California Institute of Integral Studies, and author of How to Be a Health Coach. mail@megjordan.com)

Six Dimensional Model of Wellness
Available here:  https://c.ymcdn.com/sites/www.nationalwellness.org/resource/resmgr/docs/sixdimensionsfactsheet.pdf

Illness-Wellness Continuum
http://www.thewellspring.com/wellspring/introduction-to-wellness/357/key-concept-1-the-illnesswellness-continuum.cfm

REFERENCES
1. Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity arose while working he worked as a clerk in the U.S. Patent Office.
2. Dunn, H.L. (1961). High-level wellness. Arlington, VA: Beatty Press.
3.  National Wellness Institute Six-Dimensional Model of Wellness by Bill Hettler, M.D.
4.  Travis, J., & Ryan, R.S. (2004). The Wellness workbook. (3rdEd.) Berkeley, CA: Celestial Arts.
5.   Ardell, D. Ardell Wellness Report.  Retrieved Sept. 4, 2015 from http://www.seekwellness.com/wellness/ardell_bio.htm
6. Global Wellness Institute Report, 2014. http://blog.globalwellnesssummit.com/2014/10/wellness-is-now-a-3-4-trillion-global-industry-three-times-bigger-than-the-worldwide-pharmaceutical-industry/ Retrieved September 12, 2015.
7. Thorpe, Ken. (2009). The Partnership to Fight Chronic Disease. In O’Donnell, M. (2014). Health promotion in the workplace (4th ed.) Troy, MI: American Journal of Health Promotion. 
8. Jordan, M., Wolever, R.Q., Lawson, K., & Moore, M. (2015). National Standards for Education and Training of Health and Wellness Coaches: Path Toward National Certification. Global Advances in Health and Medicine, 4(3), 46-56.
9. McGonagle, A.K., Beatty, J.E., & Joffe, R. (2014). Coaching for workers with chronic illness: Evaluating an intervention. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology,19(3), 385-398.. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/a0036601
10. Heavey, C.A., & Goetzel, R.Z. (1997). A review of health-related outcomesof multi-component worksite health promotion programs. American Journal of Health Promotion, 11(4), 290-307.
11. Mattke, S., Schnyer, C., & Van Busum, K. (2013) RAND Health Report: sA Review of the U.S. Workplace Wellness Market. Sponsored by U.S. Dept. of Labor and DHHS. Retrieved September 11, 2015. http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/pdf/workplacewellnessmarketreview2012.pdf.
12. Ward, R., & Robinson, J. (2014). How to build a thriving culture at work. Kalamazoo, MI: IHAC, Inc.
13. Putnam, L. (2015). Workplace wellness that works. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley & Sons
14. Travis, J. (2015) Legacy Address, National Wellness Conference, June 15, 2015, Minneapolis, MN.

“The behavior standards we were measuring for were pretty reasonable, not super high,” said Ellen Smit, senior author on the study and an associate professor in the OSU College of Public Health and Human Sciences. “We weren’t looking for marathon runners.”
From the perspective of public health, the findings of the research were not encouraging, Smit said.
“This is pretty low, to have so few people maintaining what we would consider a healthy lifestyle,” she said. “This is sort of mind boggling. There’s clearly a lot of room for improvement.”
Part of the value of this study, the researchers said, is that the results are based on a large study group, 4,745 people from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. It also included several measured behaviors, rather than just relying on self-reported information.
Measurements of activity were done with an accelerometer, a device people wore to determine their actual level of movement, with a goal of 150 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous activity a week. Blood samples were done to verify a person was a non-smoker. Body fat was measured with sophisticated X-ray absorptiometry, not just a crude measurement based on weight and height. A healthy diet was defined in this study as being in about the top 40 percent of people who ate foods recommended by the USDA.
The lifestyle characteristics were then compared to “biomarkers” of cardiovascular health. Some are familiar, such as blood pressure, cholesterol and glucose levels. Others are more sophisticated, such as C-reactive protein, fasting triglycerides, homocysteine and other data that can provide evidence of cardiovascular risk.
Many people, of course, accomplished one or more of the four basic lifestyle goals, such as not smoking or being adequately active. The most striking finding was how few people accomplished all the goals.
“I would expect that the more healthy lifestyles you have, the better your cardiovascular biomarkers will look,” Smit said.
Indeed, the researchers found that having three or four healthy lifestyles, compared to none, generally was associated with better cardiovascular risk biomarkers, such as lower serum cholesterol and homocysteine levels.  Having at least one or two healthy lifestyle characteristics, compared to none, was also associated with better levels of some cardiovascular risk biomarkers.
Among the other findings of the research:

1. •Although having more than one healthy lifestyle behavior is important, specific health characteristics may be most important for particular cardiovascular disease risk factors.For healthy levels of HDL and total cholesterol, the strongest correlation was with normal body fat percentage.
2. •A total of 71 percent of adults did not smoke, 38 percent ate a healthy diet, 10 percent had a normal body fat percentage, and 46 percent were sufficiently active.
3. •Only 2.7 percent of all adults had all four healthy lifestyle characteristics, while16 percent had three, 37 percent had two, 34 percent had one, and 11 percent had none.
4. •Women were more likely to not smoke and eat a healthy diet, but less likely to be sufficiently active.
5. •Mexican American adults were more likely to eat a healthy diet than non-Hispanic white or black adults.
6. •Adults 60 years and older had fewer healthy characteristics than adults ages 20-39, yet were more likely to not smoke and consume a healthy diet, and less likely to be sufficiently active.

More research is needed, experts say, to identify ways to increase the adoption of multiple healthy lifestyle characteristics among adults.
This study was published in the Mayo Clinic Proceedings and was done in collaboration with researchers from the University of Mississippi and the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga. The lead author was Paul Loprinzi, who graduated from OSU and who’s now at the University of Mississippi.

Meet the current HMF Board of Directors supporting this cause:

Len Saputo, MD (founder)
Geoffrey Marx, CNC (president)
Meg Jordan, PhD, RN, CWP
Mike Buchele, MD
Paula Szloboda, RN, MA, MBA, BC, BC-NC
Sarah Wayne, CNE
Since our last event at the Dean Lesher with Dr. Bruce Lipton, (maybe you were there?) our board of directors took a break, took time to reflect, and evaluate where we are going together. We have been gathering for occasional Healing Circles on Fridays at the Clinic in Walnut Creek.
 
If you have want to know more about Healing Circles available to you at no cost reply to this email with "Healing Circle" in the subject and we will get back to you with details.

We want to hear from you
Please take a moment to introduce yourself and let us know more about your interest in bringing Health Medicine to your community.

In service,
The HMF Team
 
Copyright © 2014 Health Medicine Forum, All rights reserved. 
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(EarthTalk, E Magazine----)How is it that global warming could cause an increase in health problems and disease epidemics? Do we have any evidence that it is already happening?  -- Jim Merrill, Provo, UT


Global warming isn’t just bad for the environment. There are several ways that it is expected to take a toll on human health. For starters, the extreme summer heat that is becoming more normal in a warming world can directly impact the health of billions of people.


“Extreme high air temperatures contribute directly to deaths from cardiovascular and respiratory disease, particularly among elderly people,” reports the World Health Organization (WHO). “In the heat wave of summer 2003 in Europe, for example, more than 70,000 excess deaths were recorded.” ​

​


WHO adds that high temperatures also play a role in elevated levels of ozone and other air pollutants known to exacerbate respiratory and cardiovascular problems. And according to the non-profit Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), warmer temperatures and higher levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide can stimulate plants to grow faster, mature earlier and produce more potent allergens. “Common allergens such as ragweed seem to respond particularly well to higher concentrations of carbon dioxide, as do pesky plants such as poison ivy. Allergy-related diseases rank among the most common and chronic illnesses…” reports the group.


Another way global warming is bad for our health is that it increases extreme weather events that can injure or kills large numbers of people. According to WHO, the number of weather-related natural disasters has more than tripled since the 1960s. Likewise, increasingly variable rainfall patterns combined with higher overall temperatures are leading to extended droughts around the world. “By the 2090s, climate change is likely to widen the area affected by drought, double the frequency of extreme droughts and increase their average duration six-fold,” reports WHO. One result is likely to be a downturn in agricultural productivity along with a spike in malnutrition. Another is less access to safe drinking water, a trigger for poor sanitation and the spread of diarrheal diseases—not to mention resource wars.


Perhaps most worrying to public health experts, though, is the potential for global warming to cause a spike in so-called “vector-borne diseases” like schistosomiasis, West Nile virus, malaria and dengue fever. “Insects previously stopped by cold winters are already moving to higher latitudes (toward the poles),” reports UCS. Researchers predict that thanks to global warming an extra two billion people, mostly in developing countries, will be exposed to the dengue virus over the next half century. 


A related fear is that thawing permafrost in Polar Regions could allow otherwise dormant age-old viruses to re-emerge. Earlier this year, French and Russian researchers discovered a 30,000 year old giant virus, previously unknown to science, in frozen soil in Russia’s most northerly region. While the virus, which researchers dubbed Pithovirus sibericum, is harmless to humans and animals, its discovery has served as a wake-up call to epidemiologists about the potential re-emergence of other viruses that could make many people sick. While some of these re-emergent viruses might also be new to science, others could be revitalized versions of ones we thought we had eradicated, such as smallpox.


CONTACTS: WHO, www.who.int; UCS, www.ucsusa.org.


EarthTalk® is written and edited by Roddy Scheer and Doug Moss and is a registered trademark of E - The Environmental Magazine(www.emagazine.com). Send questions to: earthtalk@emagazine.com.

(SAN FRANCISCO---)  Neuroscience used to be the subject where geniuses flourished and the rest of us grimaced--but not anymore. Neuroscience is hot, and everybody from app designers to massage therapists claim to apply the latest findings
​
The last decade of neuroscience research has produced an explosion of novel approaches to track the bidirectional interfaces between the brain and all other cellular structures. Some of the neuroscience research heads toward cognition and behavior, and winds up informing the expanding field of Positive Psychology. This is where you'll find evidence-informed practices for mindfulness, meditation, breath work, and other forms of stress reduction

Other research in neuroscience maps out a more complex view of neurobiological systems, in which the laws of heredity seem to be rewritten every day.  Epigenetics (information from outside the gene), which arises from any number of stimuli, such as, nutritional compounds, stressful thoughts and anxiety, or environmental pollutants, has a greater effect on our DNA than we ever imagined. Neurology researcher David Perlmutter, MD, estimates that almost two-thirds of our genes responsible for the brain's health, overall physical health and longevity are controlled by epigenetic factors. 
This all leads to new understandings of human behavior and motivation, along with a blurring of the old physiology charts that mapped out discrete systems. The immune system, the gut, and the brain are so intertwined, we should declare the whole of psychophysiological functioning as more of a big network than individual systems
Where research flows, commercial enterprise follows. We are already seeing the expansion of a vibrant marketplace of digital tracking and apps for lifestyle coaching and brain optimization--all designed to get us humming along with enhanced, flexible and adaptive neuronal activation. Giving a boost to neurobiological flow of information can mean better emotional balance, attunement to communication, and body regulation.  Although we tend to think at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) that nothing quite replaces the face-to-face interaction of therapeutic and healing relationships, it is fascinating to watch the steady creep of the transhuman movement--a sort of cyborg creation
You'll find a range of ways to study neuroscience applications within programs at CIIS such as the the Integrative Health Studies M.A. degree. You'll soon start quoting your favorite research, like this one of mine:  human touch can positively influence gene expression through the activation of signal transduction molecules that span the cellular membrane.  That's reason enough to book your massage now.  For more information, write to Bridget Doran at bdoran@ciis.edu or mjordan@ciis.edu.

What can we do?

Stand up every 10 minutes and walk around. That will break up the hunched over compression of the cardiorespiratory system and visceral organs.

Do isometric exercises while sitting – tighten and relax different muscle groups.

Climb two flights of stairs every 10 minutes.
Stand at your desk. Elevate your computer to eye height.   Standing opposes gravity, and engages with slight shifts can engage stabilizer muscles and tendons and postural muscles.

Establish an exercise room at your workplace. Buy two treadmills and two exercise cycles and a set of dumbbells, plus a balancing platform.  Instead of a 20-minute lunch, book your time in the exercise room, or try going there twice a day for 10-minute bouts.

Form a walking club and spent 15 minutes, twice a day, walking briskly through our neighborhood

On a day with back-to-back meetings (Sitting Disease Thursdays?), intersperse with movement breaks or stand, wiggle and wave during meetings.

Why is prolonged sitting so harmful for your body?

Lack of physical activity can cause:
- loss of 1% muscle mass every year over 50
- no generation of synovial fluid formation in the joints, leading to stiffness and aches
- decrease in osteoblast formation, leading to bone loss
-  increase in abdominal body fat and increased waist circumference and obesity
-  decrease in HDL-cholesterol, the scavenger of bad LDL cholesterol
-  poor quality sleep
-  increase in general fatigue
-  associated with increase in depression
- associated with increase in dementia
- associated with increase in certain cancers
- undeniably linked to metabolic syndrome, type 2 diabetes, stroke and heart disease

Is there any good news here?

Yes. The researchers discovered that undoing the 9-12 hours of prolonged sitting a day did not require sweat-producing, arduous exercise.  The negative impact could be turned around by engaging in non-fatiguing activity as much as possible.  Do anything – just don’t sit.

#    #    #   
Dr. Meg Jordan, PhD, RN, CWP, is author of HOW TO BE A HEALTH COACH, Department Chair and Professor of Integrative Health Studies M.A. Program at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco.  She is editor and founder of AFAA’s American FitnessMagazine.  mjordan@ciis.edu

Medical Tourism: Sick Rx for Global Energy Consumption
SAN FRANCISCO---) Two social forces—the increase in medical tourism and the imperative to decrease fossil fuel consumption—are at loggerheads. For a privileged group of health-seekers considering a wellness holiday or face lift at a destination spa or hip replacements, it's easy to hop on an international flight to Rio or Mumbai or Singapore. For over a decade, that has been the prerogative of the elite traveler, who figures their contribution to the global economy offsets any bump in greenhouse gas emissions. 
That logic might be hard to argue since new job markets have sprung up in formerly impoverished areas. But what if the masses—the thousands of millions below the super-affluent—decided that distant lands were the places to see doctors, get health care, buy elective surgeries, and enjoy wellness tune-ups? What does that do for efforts to curb fossil fuel production and excessive energy consumption? 

Well, the masses are being beckoned. Wellness tourism campaigns for every body at every budget are unfolding from Kerala, India to Bolivia, and promises of renewed health and vitality leave a wake of extravagant fuel consumption, along with tons of discarded water bottles. As a past speaker of the Global Spa and Wellness Summit, I'm receiving blog reports from the ongoing conference in Delhi, where the medical/wellness tourism industry tops $438 billion, according to a new SRI report commissioned by the top spas of the world. 
Medical/wellness tourism is defined as, "Travel associated with the pursuit of maintaining or enhancing one's personal wellbeing." The SRI reports predicts that it will grow by 17% next year, 50% faster than overall global tourism, especially in Asia, Latin America, and Middle East/North Africa. India alone is expected to have a 20% a year increase through 2017, a major part of the $438.6 billion global market. 
India's success in turning "backwaters" into "spa boom towns" was the reason the Summit went to India this year. Keynote speaker, Amitabh Kant, CEO of the Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor Development Corporation, kicked off the Summit by chronicling the transformation of the southern state of Kerala from just another "sun and sand" destination to gleaming tourism model of Ayurvedic health, according to the GSWS blog. Even though Kerala is not the birthplace of Aryuveda, there are 119 Ayurveda hospitals and 16 Ayurveda colleges that were promoted along with a houseboat-exploration option for "cultural immersion." Now Kerala is honored as one of "50 must see" destinations in the world by travel magazines. 
I have no problem with the idea of seeking vigor or rejuvenation away from home. It's been part of healing quests since ancient Greeks journeyed to the temple of Aesclepius. But the philosophical dialogue for entering into a time of reflection and rejuvenation is worlds apart from the devastating impact of unhindered energy consumption and mounting greenhouse gas, bolstered by an outdated model of capitalism. We are fast approaching a point of no return if we continue to burn fossil fuels at the present rate, while the U.S and the rest of the G8 is joined by the rapidly growing economies of India, China, Southeast Asia and Latin America. 
Plus, there is something to be said for getting well in one's backyard, with use of locally produced foods, seasonally cultivated herbs and home-grown therapies for whatever ails you. Localized healing makes sense from a medical anthropology standpoint, since definitions of health and illness are cultural constructs to begin with, and healing encompasses much more than global marketplace purchases for monoculture demands, whether it's stem cells or Tahitian massages. 
Perhaps I'm just sensitive to medical care via a 22-hour flight, because I've tried it myself and realized the price you pay is more than the airline ticket. Follow-up and complications are rampant, and the therapeutic alliance of healer and seeker is non-existent or at least rarely delivered. 
I'm also moved by the message I just heard by Kumi Naidoo, Executive Director of Greenpeace International, as he defended Greenpeace's actions against the Russian ship looking to drill for fossil fuel in the Arctic. In a compelling message delivered to journalist Bill Moyers, Naidoo said it's time to wake up and courageously face the truth of how we're destroying our future prospects of human habitation on planet earth through our reckless and willful disregard for the causes of climate change. "Leave the oil in the soil, and coal in the hole," quipped Kaidoo to Bill Moyers in a recent interview. I'm passing that along to the medical/wellness tourism industry. 
See http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-moyers/kumi-naidoo-on-greenpeace_b_4003381.html) 
How do we reconcile this search for cheap health care two continents away with unending surge in greenhouse gas emissions? How do we practice regionally-based wellness in a post-fossil fuel age? 
I can think of two immediate ways right now. 
1. Learn how a wellness lifestyle can halt and reverse the most crippling chronic diseases that ravage future health by getting an M.A. in Integrative Health at CIIS and learn to be a CIIS Certified Integrative Wellness Coach. You'll be a significant agent of health care change. Consider enrolling in spring 2014 or fall 2013. 
http://www.ciis.edu/Academics/Graduate_Programs/Integrative_Health_Studies.html 
2. Shore up your spirit and intellect and social connections by attending Bioneers, either in person or virtually on October 18-20, 2013, in San Rafael, CA. 
http://conference.bioneers.org/sat/ 
Feel free to talk to me anytime about your desire to advocate for a healthier way of living for all. Prof. Meg Jordan, Chair of Integrative Health Studies, California Institute of Integral Studies. mjordan@ciis.edu 415 599-5523