Continuing on with your life as normal can seem a little harder when you’ve been diagnosed with a chronic disease such as COPD. If you can keep from being stuck to your couch while using your oxygen therapy, you’ve just conquered a little part of why COPD feels like a ball and chain. Carl O. has always been active in his community, but now his diagnosis with COPD has inspired him to do even more for others. He wasn’t about to let COPD keep him from doing what he’s always done.
Aside from strengthening your lungs and heart, there are a few more reasons to exercise, especially if you have a chronic disease like Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD). Being physically active is good for your entire body, and it causes a healthy chain-reaction that you will notice quickly.
The average adult should be getting 150 hours of exercise per week, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), which is easy to achieve if you break it up over the course of a week. You can also work your way up to this amount to ease you into it.
May has been declared National Fitness and Sports Month to try to educate Americans on how they can help prevent diseases and general bad health by getting the physical activity they need. According to Fitness.gov and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), an adult should be getting around 150 minutes of exercise per week.
Of course, these 150 minutes can be broke up into smaller amounts of time each day – that divides out to 30 minutes 5 days a week, or about 22 minutes 7 days a week. If you can’t reach 30 or 22 minutes every day that you exercise, but you dedicate at least 15 minutes a day, this will still make a difference on your general health. A combination of cardio and strength exercise is recommended, to cover your circulatory and respiratory systems, as well as your bone and muscles strength and balance.
Having COPD, or another condition that requires oxygen therapy, doesn’t necessarily mean you need to sit at home all day and take it easy – far from it. You can still do all the things you’ve been wanting to do, as long as you pay attention to your body’s needs and heed your doctor’s advice.
If you want to help coach your grandson’s baseball team or go camping with your granddaughter’s girl scout troop, you can do those things, even if you need to use oxygen therapy. This means you don’t need to only spend time with your grand kids when they come over to visit.
This is our customer Walter W and his Respironics SimplyGo on the top of Kilauea Volcano on the island of Hawaii. Kilauea is a shield volcano in the Hawaiian Islands and is the most active of the five volcanoes that together form the island of Hawai’i.
Walter used his SimplyGo to help him climb to the top of the crater rim; the rim has an elevation of 4,190 ft. and the trail was a walking distance of over a mile.
If you have a story or picture that you would like to share, please email sridl@amsrco.com.
This customer is Phyllis Fritz, the beautiful mother of Judy Attaldo. She is a friendly NY lady who is very inspirational to many oxygen users by showing off her skills at the skate park, skateboarding! Phyllis enjoys her SeQual Eclipse 3 so much she literally takes it everywhere she goes, grocery store, motorcycle trips, 4 wheeling, skateboarding, and for everyday activities!
The portable oxygen machine has made the life of this lovely customer much more enjoyable! Even if your grandchildren wish to take a field trip to the skate park, American Medical has a wide variety of machines that will meet your needs and make this possibility a reality.
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On August 10, an intrepid bunch of AMSR staff, customers, and vendor reps proved that oxygen users can enjoy the high life.
The group of 10 completed a 5-mile hike near Idaho Springs, Colorado. Supplemental oxygen in tow, they left the trailhead at Summit Lake (elevation 12,840 feet) at 9 a.m. and summited scenic Mount Evans (elevation 14,264 feet) at 1:30 p.m.
