In this 5‑8 minute daily health update, Dr. David Koivuranta (Dr. Dave) from the Toronto Neck and Back Pain Clinic presents six concise wellness topics, each backed by recent research or public‑health guidelines. He first discusses the link between chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), use of positive airway pressure (PAP) machines for sleep, and increased musculoskeletal pain, urging assessment of sleep quality. Next, he shares 2020 Associated Press guidelines recommending exclusive breastfeeding for at least six months and avoiding added sugar until age two, emphasizing long‑term health benefits. He then highlights the extensive cardiovascular, metabolic, musculoskeletal, and balance advantages of regular walking, citing Australian health department recommendations. The fourth segment warns that adolescent vaping is associated with a 77 % higher likelihood of cognitive complaints such as brain fog, based on a large 2018 federal survey. The fifth topic presents population data showing that 82 % of U.S. adults are non‑smokers and roughly 80‑93 % avoid excessive alcohol, while noting binge‑drinking remains a health challenge. Finally, he reviews a study of 110 information‑technology professionals revealing that 38 % experience upper‑body pain, with risk factors including long work hours, excessive smartphone use, poor posture, and inadequate workstation setup, and he offers practical ergonomic advice. Throughout, Dr. Dave stresses that small daily learning and habit changes can positively influence overall health, especially during the pandemic and winter season.
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Hello everyone, it's Dr. Dave. Hopefully you're all doing well, enjoying your week. Welcome to Thursday, you made it! Congratulations, I hope you have a great one. Coming at you on behalf of the Toronto Neck and Back Pain Clinic with your daily health update. It's Thursday, January 28th, 2021. I'm going to share with you 6 areas of health and wellness today. Somewhere around this video you can read through all 6 areas. If you'd like a copy, DM us on social, give us a call, send us an email, we'll make sure you get that. Not going to treat, diagnose, prevent, or cure any illness or disease with our time together today. However, I can virtually guarantee you that by spending some time every day learning and hearing about health and wellness, it will support your own health and wellness efforts in a positive way, whether that requires improvement or maintenance or prevention and anything else similar to that when it comes to health and wellness. It's just a good strategy, and we do it for you in about 5 to 8 minutes every day, so thanks for joining us. All right, it's another good one today, hope you enjoy. The International Journal of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease, December 2020, says that chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is a chronic lung disease that makes breathing difficult and it's the leading causes of death, and is one of the leading causes of death, not the leading cause, in the United States. Data from the 2018 Danish Health and Morbidity Survey showed that individuals with COPD, chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder, are almost 26% more likely to have had musculoskeletal pain in the last 14 days and almost 3 times more likely to have chronic musculoskeletal pain. So it's no coincidence that here in the clinic we have many patients with neck and back pain that do sleep with a PAP machine, positive airway pressure machine, and, um, they have musculoskeletal pain. Now, might just be a coincidence, may not always be a correlation, but there seems to be a high coincidence based on the research and literature that one may lead to the other. And getting a good night's sleep, making sure that your body is properly oxygenated can perhaps lead to some concerns with comorbidity. So taking care of one condition, trying to improve it and help it, will of course help your body avoid and/or improve other conditions. So that's why all our lifestyle factors work together. So try and improve that sleep, get to— get on top. If you know you're a snorer or you know that someone says you stop breathing at night, you wanna get that assessed and get some help to improve it for sure. For kids 2 and under, according to the Associated Press, December 2020, new guidelines saying that babies should be breastfed until at least 6 months and should avoid being fed sugar until after the age of 2. Don't give them sugar very much ever, hopefully, maybe, is a good strategy as well, especially added sugar. And, uh, Brisk Best breastfeed them for as long as you possibly can and as long as it makes sense for you and your lifestyle. And the research supports that they could be healthier and the development may be different the longer you breastfeed them and the relationship and perhaps their personality or mood may also be different the longer they're breastfed. All right. Walking provides many health benefits, as you can imagine. The Department of Health and Human Services in Australia, Victoria, Australia, December 2020, says that they list the following benefits of walking: increased cardiovascular and pulmonary fitness, reduced risk of heart disease and stroke, some leading causes of death in North America, along with that COPD we talked about, improved management of diabetes, hypertension, high cholesterol, joint and muscular pain or stiffness, gives you stronger bones and improved balance, increased muscle strength and endurance, and reduced body fat. All good things just for going on a stroll. So get out there in our cool winter weather and, uh, go for a nice little walk. Tobacco-Induced Diseases report from December 2020 says vaping is posing problems for adolescent brains. They did an analysis from a 2018 federal survey of over 18,000 teenagers and revealed that those who started vaping in middle school were 77% more likely to report cognitive complaints such as brain fog. So that's pretty statistically significant, 77%. And, uh, the world is challenging enough as it is, and we want to try and be clear and focused and with good energy energy, mood, let our personality and our characteristics that keep us and support us being an individual strong, uh, vaping may not be a good option to have that as an outcome. But contrary to that, the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, January 2021, says that many adults don't smoke or drink excessively. They looked at data from 2016 to 2018, the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, with over 450,000 adults, and the report said that 82% were non-smokers and 92.8% 80% avoided excessive alcohol intake, which is amazing. The binge drinking with the alcohol is really where the challenge is. It's, you know, not that daily drink or two, maybe a drink for women, two drinks for men, or even just once a week, twice a week, which seems to be moderation. But it's that once a week where there's excessive number of drinks in a very short period of time is very hard, very stressful on the body and can lead to some health complications. Are you an IT professional? Uh, information technology, of course, huge these days. And according to the journal Work, December 2020, they looked at 110 information technology professionals, and 38.2% of them had pain in the upper body, with neck pain, back pain, and eye strain as their most common complaints. Further analysis showed that the following are associated with increased risk for work-related upper body pain: long hours, excessive smartphone usage, lack of exercise, improper workstation setup, and poor posture. So what we're doing and how we're doing it, how much we're doing it, uh, is very important, whether IT professional or otherwise. So a little change in our awareness, a little change in our habits can support a different outcome when it comes to how we feel, especially with our gadgets and the upper body— upper back, neck, and arms. So keep an eye on that today. There's lots of information on Google, lots of videos on YouTube on how to set up a workstation, how to use your phone. But just think tall, be tall, sit tall, and be that attractive lady or man in the room. And it's actually good for your health, right? Okay, so that's your daily health update for Thursday. Hope you enjoyed it. Have a wonderful day. Take care of each other. Share some smiles. We're gonna get through this pandemic. We're gonna get through the winter. We're gonna get through anything that comes our way when we're at our best and your health can support you through that. You will never go wrong by spending time and effort on those thoughts, decisions, and actions you take every day when it comes to your health and wellness. And just keep up the good work, all right? We'll have a written format for you tomorrow on Friday, the Daily Health Update, and then I'll catch up with you again on Monday with a new video. Enjoy the weekend. Take care.
