Take a look at our February newsletter!
theptdoctor.com
718.747.2019
Hours of Operation: Monday–Friday 8 a.m. – 4 p.m.
February 2023
ON THE
MOVE
The ‘Silver Bullet’ To Improve Your Health
You could probably do a thousand things right now to be a little bit healthier — sleep an extra hour, walk a little more, eat more leafy greens, and on and on and on. You’ve heard all this from your doctors and those health magazines in their offices. But the way I see it, there is ONE thing that stands out above the rest. It’s the closest thing we’ve got to a silver bullet! Is it something you can eat? A supplement you can take? A book you can read? Nope! It’s something you can DO — strength training . I’ll say it again: Strength training is absolutely the most important thing you can do right now to improve your health. This holds true whether you’re currently coming to PT to address a problem or staying home because you feel just fine. Either way, strength training — and more specifically, progressive resistance training (PRE) — will improve your life. Why will strength training change your life? Well, if you have stronger muscles and joints, you’ll be able to move more easily, which opens up a whole new world of possibilities! You can spend all day in the museum with your kids without getting tired. You can squat down on the floor to play with your grandkids. You can lose weight, improve your cardiovascular health, and reduce your risk of strokes. You can even fight off anxiety, boost your mood, ease your arthritis, build better balance, improve your sleep, and find more energy to push through the day. Strength training isn’t a fad from TikTok or the latest hot tip from Instagram. It wasn’t dreamed up by someone to make a buck in today’s world of 2-second videos and dopamine hits. It’s just a tried-and-true method that actually works. If you stick with progressive resistance training and slowly increase your weight or reps over time (say going from two pounds to three after three weeks or increasing your reps from 10 to 12), you WILL get the benefits. But sometimes we need some motivation other than health improvements to tip the scale in a positive direction. What is that other motivation and why should you care? I’ll tell you
why: Your family needs YOU. Even if your kids are grown and your grandkids live hours away, they need your wisdom and experience to navigate today’s crazy world
It’s chaos out there! In the last few years, we’ve seen people, communities, and even countries overreact big time to the news of the day. But you’ve seen it all already. You know that we’ll get through this — and you need to be healthy and strong so that you can be the port in the storm for your family to tell them everything is going to be alright. I was lucky enough to have that foundation growing up. My grandmother was a calm, methodical, and mellow person. I never saw her shout, change her mind on a whim, or boil over with rage. Instead, she spent hours in the garden, tending to her plants and looking after her young, excitable grandkids. When I got worked up over a problem, she told me, “Robbie, it will work itself out.” I’m glad I had my grandmother’s wisdom and experience to put my life into perspective — and your family will be glad to have yours, even if it takes them years to admit it! You can be the person who sets them straight with a simple conversation because you have been through the ups and downs of life and you know what it takes to prevail. Strength training will help you be there for your family for years to come, and you don’t have to go it alone. All you have to do is call our office and make an appointment. We’ll teach you the process needed for progressive resistance exercise because we know what it takes to keep you on track to live the longest, happiest, healthiest life you can.
–Dr. Robert Morea
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YOUR INTELLECTUAL WELLNESS MATTERS! Challenge Yourself to Expand Your Mind
How to Foster and Develop Intellectual Wellness Intellectual wellness differs from other types of well-being. You need to work hard and challenge yourself to stay intellectually healthy. If you’re looking to improve or nurture your intellectual wellness, here are three ways to do it. 1. Learn a new skill. One of the main components of intellectual wellness is working to acquire more knowledge. This doesn’t need to be physics or engineering but can be something as simple as cooking a new healthy recipe, learning to draw, or attempting a DIY home repair project. The important part is that mastering something new provides an information- based approach to the world around you. 2. Remove subjectivity. We view every situation with a pre-formed opinion or bias. The truth is our brains are wired this way to streamline thinking, but to be intellectually healthy, we must work hard to push past it. Remove subjectivity by learning a different way to perform a task or challenge yourself to understand (or simply read) the ideas of others. Be objective, even when you disagree with them. 3. Improve your critical thinking. Next time you’re engaged in conversation, try being thoroughly engaged and think about what is being said. Ask questions to yourself and others, and hash out what you agree with and things you don’t. Work to keep your brain active in everything you do by finding a connection to everything around you.
These days, as taking care of our health becomes more important than ever, we hear a lot about our physical wellness and how to improve it using nutritious foods and exercise.
But what about our intellectual wellness?
What is intellectual wellness? The University of New Hampshire defines intellectual wellness as “being open to new ideas, thinking critically, and finding ways to be creative.” Essentially, this means thinking about the world around you with an open mind and putting energy into what you’re thinking, not just allowing your brain to run idly.
Signs of healthy intellectual wellness include:
• Ability to see an issue from all sides • Purposeful exposure to ideas, beliefs, and people who differ from yourself
• Awareness of your core values • Capacity to learn new things
Balance: It’s More Than Just an Act
More studies reveal that balance is a great indicator of life span or disease. In fact, a recent study released by the British Journal of Sports Medicine showed that people who could not balance on one foot for at least 10 seconds were nearly twice as likely to die within the next 10 years. But as we age, balance can become more challenging, and losing your balance can lead to falls or other serious accidents. Luckily, these mishaps are preventable with some help from balance training. Balance training just means taking a few minutes each day to perform simple exercises that help improve your balance, and according to the Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, doing so can reduce the risk of falling by up to 40%!
Here are a few simple exercises you can do at home to improve your balance. For safety, we recommend completing these exercises near a sturdy surface you can use for support if you need it. Standing March While standing, slowly march in place for 20–30 seconds. How fast or slow you complete this exercise is up to you, but once you feel it becoming easier, you can pick up your marching pace or move to a different floor texture, like carpet, grass, or hardwood, for a challenge. The idea here is that marching forces you to temporarily stand on one foot, even for a few seconds.
the chair without using your arms to help push you up. If this is too difficult, feel free to add a pillow or foam pad to the seat to reduce the distance between sitting and standing. Once you’re standing, slowly lower yourself back into the chair. Try not to fall back into it (which allows gravity to control the fall); instead, ease yourself into the seat. Repeat as many times as you can. Heel-to-Toe Walk Standing straight, place one foot directly in front of the other so the heel of your leading foot is touching the toes of the one behind it. Hold this position for 30 seconds before moving the back foot to the front of the previously leading foot, with its heel touching the other foot’s toes. Repeat as many times as you can.
Sit to Stand In a chair, sit with your feet
planted firmly on the floor in front of you. Then, rise from
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BRING ON THE BUGS! FOODS THAT HELP — AND HARM — OUR MICROBIOME
Inside all of us is a bustling community of bacteria, parasites, fungi, and viruses. But don't worry! These microbiota work hard to keep our bodies balanced and healthy. They are so crucial to our health that they’ve been labeled a supporting organ because of what they do to keep our systems running smoothly. And what we eat can have a significant impact on the well- being of our microbiota. So, here are foods we can eat to help these tiny residents keep our health in check as well as foods to avoid so we don't sabotage the benefits they provide. Foods That Help Our Microbiome The key to helping our little microbiota is by creating a lower pH level in our colons. To do this, we need to consume foods high in healthy fiber. The microbiota in our bodies break down these fibers using enzymes and, as a result, ferment the fiber inside our gut. This fermentation releases short-chain fatty acids, or SCFAs, essential to lowering our pH. SCFAs make our colons more acidic and, by doing so, stop the growth of harmful bacteria that cannot survive in a low- pH environment. Foods that support increased SCFAs are indigestible carbohydrates and fibers. Our stomachs don’t break these down, so they arrive whole to our intestines, ready for our tiny microbiota to eat. These carbohydrates and fibers are called prebiotics, and while we can take many drugstore prebiotics as supplements, it’s always better to feed our little friends from natural food sources.
The following foods contain the highest amounts of natural prebiotics:
• Garlic • Onions • Leeks • Asparagus • Bananas
• Seaweed • Wheat • Oats • Barley
To get the most out of these prebiotic-packed foods, eat them as close to raw as possible!
Foods That Hurt Our Microbiome Just like foods can help give our microbiome a major power-up, many foods can harm it. Even worse, some foods encourage harmful gut bacteria to thrive and make us sick. Here are the top foods to stay away from:
• Artificial sweeteners (like stevia, aspartame, and sucralose)
• Fried foods • Red meat • Soft drinks
These foods help grow harmful bacteria and actively disrupt the environment of our microbiota, so it’s best not to include these so our little helpers stay healthy!
TAKE A BREAK!
Feta Chicken Burgers Inspired by TasteOfHome.com
INGREDIENTS
• 1/4 cup finely chopped cucumber • 1/4 cup reduced-fat mayonnaise • 1/2 cup chopped roasted sweet red pepper • 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1/2 tsp Greek seasoning • 1/4 tsp black pepper
• 1 1/2 lbs lean ground chicken • 1 cup crumbled feta cheese • 6 whole wheat hamburger buns, split and toasted
DIRECTIONS
1. Preheat broiler. Mix chopped cucumber and mayonnaise and set aside. 2. For the burgers, mix the red pepper, garlic powder, Greek seasoning, and black pepper. Add chicken and cheese; mix lightly but thoroughly (the mixture will be sticky). Shape into 6 patties about 1/2-inch thick. 3. Broil burgers, remembering to cook both sides thoroughly. Serve on buns with cucumber sauce. If desired, top with lettuce and tomato. Enjoy!
718.747.2019 • THEPTDOCTOR.COM • 3
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PRST STD US POSTAGE PAID BOISE, ID PERMIT 411
718.747.2019
theptdoctor.com 212-73 26th Ave. Bayside, NY 11360
Hours of Operation: Monday–Friday 8 a.m. – 4 p.m.
1. The Easiest Way to Be Healthier 2. Intellectual Wellness: What It Is and How to Improve Yours 3 Exercises to Improve Your Balance INSIDE THIS ISSUE
3. Prebiotics to the Rescue! Feta Chicken Burgers
4. Improve Your Workouts With the Mind-Muscle Connection
USE THE MIND-MUSCLE CONNECTION Mind Over Matter Isn’t Enough!
Turn off distractions. Remember the music or podcast we mentioned earlier? Turn it off! This also includes silencing your phone or turning off any nearby TVs. It may take some time to get used to working out in silence, but with nowhere else to wander, the brain has an easier time focusing on those muscle movements. Visualize the muscles you are using. Every time you move, whether using a stationary bike, taking a walk, or lifting weights in a gym, picture the muscles you’re using in your head. Imagine the muscle fibers stretching and contracting with each movement. Use cues to remind you of your working muscles. Sometimes, our minds drift off during a workout, and that’s normal. But if you
Many assume working out is the muscle's job, pushing weights around as we enjoy a song or listen to a podcast. While this may be a fun way to pass the time, you're not doing your fitness any favors with your mind elsewhere. When you work out, you should use a "mind-muscle connection," or purposely think about the movement and contractions of your muscles as you use them. This is better because when your brain consciously focuses on your muscles and their contractions, it employs more muscle fibers to complete the task. You build strength in a more complete, well-rounded way. If you're not using a mind-muscle connection yet, don't worry! Here’s how you can start next time you’re ready to sweat.
find your head in the clouds more often than you’re thinking about your exercise, it might be time to use a few cues. A cue simply reminds you of what you’re physically doing. One way to incorporate a cue is to talk to yourself with each repetition. For example, if you’re performing a bench press, you can say “up” when you push the bar away and “down” when you lower it toward you. Utilize time under tension. The slower you perform your exercise, the more opportunity your brain has to talk to those muscles you’re using. Try holding each repetition for three seconds before moving on to the next, and as you hold, visualize those muscles for the entire three seconds.
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20 YEARS IMPROVING MOVEMENT NATURALLY
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Celebrating 20 years of serving the Bayside Community! We have so much gratitude and appreciation for our community for allowing us to serve you and helping us to reach this milestone! We want to do something to celebrate so, to THANK YOU, our valued customers, we are having ONE DAY OF FREE EXAMS for:
• All past clients who have not been seen in PT in more than 3 months
• All present clients who have another problem currently not being treated
• All loved ones, family, friends, neighbors, and co-workers of our past and present patients
THE FREE EXAMS WILL BE ON TUESDAY, FEB. 21! The Free Exam consists of a 30-minute one-on-one appointment with the Physical Therapist of your choice! During your one-on-one appointment, your physical therapist will talk with you about the history of your problem. They will take measurements to test your movement and strength. After a thorough exam, they will give you a written copy of: • The cause of your pain or problem. • A plan for successful treatment. If you are a past or present patient, call 718.747.2019 to schedule your free exam. If you are referring a friend or family member, give them the Free Exam coupon and have them call 718.747.2019 to schedule their appointment.
CELEBRATE WITH FREE EXAM!
The Physical Therapy Doctor 212-73 26th Ave. Bayside, NY 11360 718.747.2019 ThePTDoctor.com
20 YEARS IMPROVING MOVEMENT NATURALLY
This coupon may be given to friends and family. Limited to the first 30 appointments. Call 718.747.2019 to register now FREE EXAMS WILL BE HELD ON FEB. 21, 2023.
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20 YEARS IMPROVING MOVEMENT NATURALLY
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Celebrating 20 years of serving the Bayside Community! THE APPOINTMENTS ARE FREE, BUT SPOTS ARE LIMITED. CALL 718.747.2019 TO SCHEDULE YOUR FREE EXAM TODAY!
This FREE EXAM is ideal for people suffering with: • Lower Back Pain
• Headaches • Shoulder Pain • Knee Pain • Problems Walking
• Arthritis • Sciatica • Neck Pain
If you are having pain or problems with day-to-day activities such as walking, standing, sitting for long periods, going up or down steps, getting in or out of your car, sleeping, or driving, this is an excellent opportunity to see one of our world-class therapists and find out the cause of your problem. CALL 718.747.2019 FOR YOUR FREE EXAM ON TUESDAY, FEB. 21! Call TODAY to reserve your spot! Sincerely, –Dr. Robert Morea Physical Therapist & Founder P.S. - Spots are limited and filling fast! Call 718.747.2019 now to make an appointment! P.P.S. - As a Special Celebration Bonus, everyone who has an exam will receive a copy of our sponsored book, “Pain Free Motion for Your Lower Back.”
CELEBRATE WITH FREE EXAM!
The Physical Therapy Doctor 212-73 26th Ave. Bayside, NY 11360 718.747.2019 ThePTDoctor.com
20 YEARS IMPROVING MOVEMENT NATURALLY
This coupon may be given to friends and family. Limited to the first 30 appointments. Call 718.747.2019 to register now FREE EXAMS WILL BE HELD ON FEB. 21, 2023.
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