A big bow to Strength Training

Wouter van den Heuvel Uncategorized

All types of exercise are conducive for improving health and fitness. Upping your exercise-regime if you want to improve your physical and psychological health is a no-brainer. Offcourse, optimizing other factors such as nutrition, sleep, stress, having meaningful relationships and a sense of purpose in life will surely help as well.

In recent years, Strength Training has been given a prominent place in daily exercise guidelines1. If exercise is medicine, Strength Training is the most powerful (pun intended) drug that we have2.

This is however in contrast with daily practice. A number of studies have shown many physiotherapists do not promote increasing physical-activity for their patients, and even that many physiotherapists do not know what the current recommendations for physical activity are3. To add to this missed opportunity, a recent systematic review in the British Medical Journal has shown that for musculoskeletal conditions, just 54% of physiotherapists provide recommended evidence based treatments, 43% of them provided treatments that were not-recommended and 81% of them provided treatments where there was no recommendation for.4

In a recent article published in Sports Medicine5, the authors of the study wrote a review about the systemic health benefits of Strength Training on:

  • Musculoskeletal health, for muscle, tendons, bone and cartilage.
  • Metabolic diseases such as the metabolic syndrome, and type II diabetes.
  • Cardiovascular diseases
  • Cancers
  • Cognitive Health & Dementia.
  • Psychological health, such as depression and anxiety.

My intention is not to adress all of them in this article. However, the body of evidence does show us that every individual can benefit from engaging in Strength Training, regardless of their current age, health-status, or fitness-level. In fact, Strength Training has been shown the decrease all-cause mortality by about 21%. Combine Strength Training with other exercise modalities and there will be an additive effect6.

This is the reason i have decided to start Barbell Health. My goal is to provide you,  the Personal Trainer, Physical Therapist or other Health Professional, the Evidence-Based information so that you can optimize the care for your clients.

There is, however, a caveat. Our aging population is getting unhealthier, and more at-risk than ever before. This provides a unique challenge for the Health Professional. You will need to be able to work with people that have co-morbidities like type II Diabetes, Cardiovascular Disease or Orthopaedic impairments, just to name a few. These clients have special needs, and that is where Barbell Health can help you provide the coaching and content.

Besides, Barbell Health is also meant as self-help, for anyone who wants to improve his/her own Health or Fitness status, in a safe and sensible way.

Who am i? My name is Wouter. My background is in Human Movement Sciences, Physical Therapy and Personal Training/Coaching. I’ve been working in the Health domain for 15 years, with a clientele that ranges from very healthy to the person that needed to rehabilitate.

 

Sources

  1. Steele, J., Fisher, J., Skivington, M., Dunn, C., Arnold, J., Tew, G., … & Beedie, C. (2017). A higher effort-based paradigm in physical activity and exercise for public health: making the case for a greater emphasis on resistance training. BMC Public Health, 17(1), 1-8.
  2. Fiuza-Luces, C., Garatachea, N., Berger, N. A., & Lucia, A. (2013). Exercise is the real polypill. Physiology.
  3. Lowe, A., Littlewood, C., McLean, S., & Kilner, K. (2017). Physiotherapy and physical activity: a cross-sectional survey exploring physical activity promotion, knowledge of physical activity guidelines and the physical activity habits of UK physiotherapists. BMJ open sport & exercise medicine, 3(1), e000290.
  4. Zadro, J., O’Keeffe, M., & Maher, C. (2019). Do physical therapists follow evidence-based guidelines when managing musculoskeletal conditions? Systematic review. BMJ open, 9(10), e032329.
  5. Luca, M., Paul, R., Chris, B., Konstantinos, P., Timothy, J. S., Paul, C., & Anthony, T. The Benefits of Strength Training on Musculoskeletal System Health: Practical Applications for Interdisciplinary Care. Sports medicine (Auckland, NZ).
  6. Saeidifard, F., Medina-Inojosa, J. R., West, C. P., Olson, T. P., Somers, V. K., Bonikowske, A. R., … & Lopez-Jimenez, F. (2019). The association of resistance training with mortality: A systematic review and meta-analysis. European journal of preventive cardiology, 26(15), 1647-1665.