Activity and Exercise (Nursing)

00:02 Welcome to the topic of activity and exercise.

00:05 And of course, this is a topic that's widely known, in maybe your elementary health class.

00:10 You definitely perform this in recess, which is our favorite part of the day.

00:14 But a good foundation and understanding of activity and exercise, is really important to promote, in the health and well-being of your clients.

00:23 Now, let's take a look about reminding us, what makes us move.

00:28 Of course, that wonderful skeletal system, with all of those moving joints, to help us bend and flex and kneel.

00:35 And of course, in the other image here, don't forget all that support of those ligaments, the tendons the cartilage that we have and of course, that very important skeletal muscle.

00:47 Now, we're going to talk through some of those factors, that actually, influence activity that we may really not think about.

00:53 Developmental changes being one of those.

00:56 Now, as you can imagine different developmental stages, of course, allows for different levels of engagement and abilities for example.

01:04 You can imagine maybe a toddler, wouldn't have the same level of activity or be engaged the same type of activities, as maybe, a young adult.

01:14 And of course, balancing coordination, is really important to consider through the developmental stages.

01:21 Now, this develops through childhood and is refined, gets much better in young adulthood.

01:27 But if you remember, the older we get, balance and coordination can diminish.

01:32 Therefore, falls can increase in your patients.

01:35 That's why, many times fall risk protocols are in place, in your hospital facilities.

01:41 Now, don't forget about family and social support.

01:45 This may be something that we don't think about, but of course support or even discouragement, from social networks has a big impact on motivation and just keeping up those good habits.

01:57 Now, here's a great example if you're a young adult and maybe you're in a running club or a bike club, that type of social impact will help keep you motivated, in sustaining those habits.

02:09 We also need to consider environment that can influence our activity.

02:14 Now, if we have a lack of time or engagement, of course, this will decrease the activity and decrease some of those good habits.

02:21 You can also imagine, if you don't have a neighborhood park or maybe a trail nearby or your community doesn't have these type of avenues or resources to promote activity, this can also affect it.

02:34 And now many places incorporate exercise into their schools, there's community support of course, that helps increase activities.

02:42 And there's many programs nowadays set up in schools, at an early age to help promote activity and exercise.

02:51 And of course, culture, because different cultures view exercise differently.

02:55 And cultures are motivated by various different things and different types of activities.

03:02 Now, when we're talking about activity and exercise, there are so many positive effects on health.

03:07 Such as, an increase in confidence and self-esteem, this in-course can reduce depression, it can even boost your brain power and help improve your sleep greatly.

03:18 Not to mention, that will help reduce anxiety, stress levels, just make you have a better overall well-being with better energy levels and of course increase your mood.

03:30 When we're talking about activity and exercise, let's talk about how it applies to nursing.

03:36 Now, this should be very specific to the individual, it can include maybe even passive range of motion, because that's your patient's abilities or running or swimming for example.

03:47 But a key important point to note that individuals, need to be deemed safe from your health care provider, before they start any exercise program.

03:58 A prime example is, if a patient's had heart surgery, they may not be able to go back into the same routine, that they were doing before the surgery.

04:07 They may need a specialized exercise program, such as cardiac rehabilitation, for example.

04:13 This is important because the patient can be safely monitored, during activity and exercise.

04:19 Now for those individuals that are not active, exercise for a large majority of your patients can be very intimidating.

04:27 Now, just encourage them to give them small achievable goals and also activities that are actually fun to them.

04:34 So, make sure you assess their interests this can be anything from hiking, to walking the dog, stretching or gardening.

04:42 Let's take a look at a very specific population, in regards to activity and exercise.

04:48 Now, children and adolescents are a great population to target, to minimize screen time, meaning decreased TV time, decrease video games, get them outside encourage them to play.

05:00 One consideration is, to consider them joining a team or maybe a club, this will help promote activity and also peer bonding.