Here's me, Sherrie Payton(Mrs Walter Payton), Gabrielle(my daughter) and Brandon(my son) at the talk.
I was at Healthplex in Aurora giving a talk on concussions. I met a great person that had old fashioned parents. The good kind of parent that was down to earth and followed a proper diet and got to bed on time. She seemed to have very good balancing skills with multitasking and most of all, very good at choosing and sticking to a healthy diet. Seems like her kids respect her and are following her ways of watching what goes on her plate and in her arteries. She unfortunately has some stressors typical for a high profile woman in the millenium but also has plans to deal with the stress. (I wanted to suggest more immunesupport, and antioxidants while in stress in addition to yoga and breathing classes-that defensive postion, in tolerating stress places most humans into a two fist forward, shoulders forward, back flexed chin down postion. This is the usual set up for neck stiffness and pounding headache, chest pain that comes with stress easily fixed with deep breathing and chest opening!)
The reason I bring this chance encounter up is that we are seeing a few of the baby boomers now getting in great shape. Seems like the 50's age group now is getting a taste of health with the advent of 5k's, healthclubs associated with physical therapy, numerous supplement companies, (some of them very good while many others crappy, with poor bioavailability). In the populations I have come in contact with from the Wheaton-ites of Dupage, to the newyorkers transposed to Florida, to the developing cities of Aurora and Oswego Illinois, 50% of all I see are with a BMI of 25(overweight). 40% are normal or close to overweight and 10% are in good shape. Most of the answers for the 10% club say they are doing good because they want to stay off medicines, most of the 50% say they dont know what a BMI is or that they dont have insurance so they havent seen a doc in a "long time". Bottom line is we are a very unhealthy nation leaving our health essentially in the hands of the fast food people hoping these companies and restaurants are doing a good job at declaring "fatfree" or "caffeine free" or "no transfat". Well, guess what, all that great tasting stuff is taken out with the addition of something else synthetic sugar substitutes...places still need to sell and "hook" buyers so they will pay and return to pay again. Doctors have great intentions to watch our risk factors and reverse them once found.....but that is usually it. ONCE risks are found, medicines can be used but you are now taking a pill every day for the rest of your life. It should always be a temporary bandaid while we make changes in life and diet. I have had the worst risk factor laiden patients get off most meds with a major reversal of diet and health habits. It's hard to keep up but once used to the diet schedule, and more over, once you get a taste of "this is how I felt when I was 20 years younger" now that is addicting and it is worth suffering through not eating that crispy cream donut and instead going for a fresh crispy fruit or colorful veggie. As I have said before about the millenium doctor office, time is money and the average visit with all medical algorithms in place only lasts for about 10-15 minutes. Not much time to figure a dietary diary over the last two weeks then come up with changes to work into the weekly grocery list. Again I say that insurance should pay for nutrition visits but seems only covered nowadays is you already are manifesting diabetes or refractory cholesterol control. (I remember once when high blood pressure was used to pay for a visit a dietician).
The "Saguil Approach" would be to find a nutritionist or napropath who knows food and pay out of pocket, visits would be finite, eventually the learning curve will plateau and one should be able to continue on alone. Patient should be able to apply the charges to a health savings account for tax free benefits. On the doctor side, billing for face to face time and counseling is LEGAL but one would have to document topic and time spent. Front desk would also have to be creative in scheduling the up coming patient for counseling dietary habits and using more time than 15 minute slots. (Certainly seems like an extra 15 minutes doesnt amount to much but if 75% of the medical problems need nutrition counsel, 75%of the schedule has to be lengthened and that translates to a 12 hour day of just patient contact. Add on 2 more hours of paper work and 1-2 hours of rounding at a hospital or volunteer work and you have broken the 15 hour work day!..hoooray!) I can only tackle one problem at a time and now it is "intellectual marketing" as Paul Pilzner refers to teaching. If enough people get taught nutrition, enough can write a letter to their insurance companies and maybe an insurance company may change what is allowed for dietary visits. I'm dreaming .....but me and Martin Luther are allowed to.
