Health Blogarithm

1% Weight Loss - End of Week 7

2012-02-18T16:14:00.000-08:00

Hmmmmm.

Here's the result

I have to tell you, I thought I'd done better than that this week. Blew out a bit on Valentine's Day but after that stayed on the straight and narrow.

But I look thinner. I feel better. I've got more energy.

However, that doesn't deflect attention away from the fact that the gap between intention and reality is getting larger. I'll just have to be more focused and work harder this week.

I'm certain that getting rid of wheat flour from my diet is a good thing.

And I'm now more convinced than ever that the way to eat is from the top of the Hourglass. If you had meat/fish/chicken and two or three veg (none of which contain over 100Kg/100gms) for every meal you'd continue to lose weight.

Meanwhile the dietecians, (including fat guru Garry Egger) and the supermarketeers are encouraging you to eat cereal for breakfast. The problem with cereal in this country is that most of what we think of as cereal is in fact flour baked up into small, funny shaped biscuits masquarading as cereals.

The NH&MRC recommendation for cereal intake for men is 12 - 24 slices of bread a day for chrissake! You're not going to get thin eating a loaf of bread a day, particularly if you lather it with butter and peanut butter.

What's pleasing is that this week is my 5Km running time started coming down - from 33 minutes to 31.27. Now a 5Km time of 31.27 is nothing to blog about. A good time would be twice Ron Clarke's worlds record of 13.16. My run is on the Stromlo Park track and it's not flat, but 31.27 is miles away from 26.32.

But I'm heartened. I'm getting fitter and can run every day. Until I bought my 'Shape' shoes I kept tearing calf muscles and Achilles tendons. They're very heavy, but that's a small price to pay for being able to run every day. If you've got sore Achilles, calves and knees I'd recommend you get a pair and see how you go. Mine cost $100 from Sketchers at DFO.

One thing I do enjoy doing is exercising with my little running mate, Honey, wonder dog from Canberra. She's loves running. You can join Honey on her Facebook site:

http://www.facebook.com/people/Honey-Miller/

While I'm running she's just walking briskly and cantering - or chasing kangaroos. Maybe George Orwell was right - four legs is better than 2!

In the meantime stay tuned.

John Miller

1% PER WEEK WEIGHT LOSS CHALLENGE

2012-02-11T17:37:00.000-08:00

Hi, John Miller here.

At the end of week six here are the results of the 1% per week weight loss challenge:

I spent Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday in Adelaide but ran every morning with my mate, Richard and kept a handle on what I ate. Richard is the fittest man in Australia over 65. He's been running for an hour a day in the Adelaide Hills for close on 40 years. It shows.

The belt is in a notch, so that's good. Nothing tastes as good as thin feels.

Not so good is I'm still behind the target and this week it eased out by 0.1 of Kg.

This forthcoming week will have to be the week of the catch up.

I'll up the exercise to include not only a morning run but 30 minutes on the stepper before tea.

Plus, you may have read that weight training helps with fat loss. They say that long after the weight training session has ended the body keeps burning energy. So this week I'll get in three weight training sessions, come hell or high water.

In the meantime, stay tuned, highly tuned and eat from the top of the Hourglass and exercise like buggery!

I'll report back next Sunday.

John Miller

FIVE WEEKS REPORT

2012-02-05T01:55:00.001-08:00

Well, soon after a rush of blood at the start of the 1% weight loss program, Christine and I drove up to Brisbane and back for about 10 days to see my daughter Lisa, her husband Ian and the two little fellas.

Blame the drink! Blame the interruption to the routine.

I've fallen behind and at the end of 5 weeks here are the results. There was no result for week 2 as I was still away and (deliberately) left the scales of justice at home.

I'll report back at the end of next week.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and go to http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/ for the back to work special offer.

John Miller

1% Weight Loss Program

2012-01-08T21:01:00.000-08:00

1% PER WEEK WEIGHT LOSS PROGRAM

People often ask, ‘How much weight can I expect to lose each week?’ I reckon 1% of your body weight sounds about right.

I’ve seen people on the Biggest Looser lose huge amounts of weight in the initial weeks, so I guess the heavier you are, say 140Kg , even though you need to lose a bit more weight each week than someone who weighs, say 70Kg, it’s an achievable target.

You know how to do it.

For starters, exercise more. Do something before each meal. Say to yourself, ‘Don’t exercise, don’t eat.’ It could be something with real vigor or something as useful as a 20 minute walk.

At the same time start eating from the top of the Hourglass. If you eat protein (meat, fish, chicken) with vegetables for every meal, and every day have several glasses of vegetables and fruit that you juiced yourself, after a couple of weeks you’ll have retrained yourself how to eat wisely and given your weight loss program a real kick-start.

Sure it will take a bit of discipline but I know you’ve got the discipline to lose 1% of your weight each week for 12 weeks. It gets easier with every week.

The things to lay off are the garbohydrates - bread, pasta, cake, biscuits, chocolate, ice cream … You won’t die by eliminating these foods from your diet. What will happen is you’ll lose weight, you’ll have less headaches, your blood pressure may come down, you’ll have more energy, it won’t feel like your trousers are ring-barking you.

If you would like to view the weight loss targets click through too:

http://www.hourglassdiet.com/diet-plan/1-percent-per-week-weight-loss-program

You could computerize your own records by creating a spreadsheet, the formula for the cell below the starting weight cell = starting weight cell minus (1% of starting weight cell)

Initially run the program for 12 weeks and see how you go. If by that time you haven't reached your target weight just keep going. The longer you're involved the easier it becomes.

Keeping yourself honest
A lady brought her son to Gandhi and asked him to tell her son to stop eating sugar.

Gandhi said to bring the boy back the next week.

The next week the lady brought the child back and Gandhi told him to stop eating sugar. A month later the lady came back and said 'My child has done what you asked, but why you not tell him to stop eating sugar the first time I came.' 'Lady', said Gandhi, “a week earlier I didn’t know if I could stop eating it myself'.

In keeping with the spirit of Gandhi I've resolved to keep myself honest by recording my weight each week for the next 12 weeks.

On the starting date, the 1st of January 2012 I weighed 86.6Kg.

At the end of the first week, the 8th of January I weighted 85.0Kg. The target was 85.7, so I've created a buffer against excess in the second week.

Each week I'll keep you posted on how I'm going.

You are invited to record your score each week by submitting a comment to this blog. If you want to protect your good name you can use a nick name , or you could really put pressure on yourself by using your real name.

I'll leave it up to you.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and set yourself a weight loss target; 1% per week until you’ve reached what you reckon is your ideal weight.

If you’d like a more detailed plan go to http://www.hourglassdiet.com/ and http://www.completefitnessworkout.com/

John Miller
www.hourglassdiet.com

New Year Resolutions

2012-01-02T21:04:00.000-08:00

Fat loss and fitness are always high on the list of New Year resolutions.

It’s almost intuitive. You get past the Christmas season and come to the sudden realization of what poor shape you’re in and resolve to do something about it.

Maybe you’ve been thinking about getting back into better shape before Christmas and haven’t had the brain space to deal with it. Maybe you’ve been too busy, too absorbed in other things or distracted.

Christmas is the divide between the years, in fact it’s become the great yearly watershed between what’s happened in the past and what you’d like to happen in the future. That’s why it’s such a significant occasion.

A huge slice of the world stops on the 25th of December each year. ‘Sorry can’t do it until the beginning of February, it’s Christmas.’ End of story. No ifs, no buts. Christmas trumps all excuses.

If we didn’t have Christmas we’d be running around like headless chooks, we’d never have the urgency to finish things off, tidy our desks, take a few days off, sleep in and take naps, slow down, read a book, spend time with family ...

Christmas gives us the freedom to do those things without feeling guilty.

But what happens as soon as you slow down? The relaxation response kicks in and stimulates the process of reconnection with your Self, particularly that part of your Self that’s closest to you, your body. You take stock. You weigh up your position.

The Self thrives on time, attention, affection and thought.

If you’ve let yourself go, if the symptoms of metabolic, musculo-skeletal and psychological dysfunction are staring you in the face you begin to ‘wake up to your Self’.

Tension starts to build up to the point where you either resolve to do something to improve your health status, or you don’t.

A lot of people are stimulated sufficiently to make a few resolutions.

The starting point to losing weight it to make the distinction between good food and junk food. Get that sorted out and you’ll start eating more of the food that’s good for you and less of the food that’s not. You’ll be on the way to getting back closer to your ideal weight.

If you’re going to tackle the metabolic dysfunctions - of which being over weight is the most obvious symptom - you’ll need to eat less junk food and up your energy expenditure level, including aerobic activity and strength activity.

Of course the secret to improving your aerobic activity is to do it in the morning before work - with other people.

I run three mornings a week with three other blokes from our street and Frank who lives around the corner. I can tell you one thing, if it wasn’t for the commitment to the group there are many mornings when I’d still be lolling around in bed at 6.30am instead of getting ready to go for a run.

Do yourself and your neighbours a favour, organise a group from your street or your neighbourhood.

If that’s too hard, organise a group at work. The chances of it happening will be enhanced if you do it in the next couple of weeks.

Don’t forget your strength training program. Whilst there are a few exercises like situps and pushups you can do at home, going to the gym makes eminent sense. That way you’ll improve your all round muscular development, and because lean muscle burns more energy it will help you lose weight.

For some people New Year resolutions are a bit like castles in the air. Just having the picture in your mind might not be enough.

Emerson said ‘If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost; that is where they should be. Now put the foundations under them.’

Underpinning your resolve by writing down your resolutions is the foundation to achieving them. Post them in a place where they stare you in the face, somewhere like the side of your bathroom mirror.

Then gather the support of people around you by inviting them to be part of your fat loss and fitness program. You’ll do them a big favour as well.

Now take advantage of the special offer to obtain your copy of the Complete Fitness Workout and the Hourglass Diet.

Here's the link to the New Year Resolutions Special Offer

http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/new-year-resolutions-2012/default.html

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and resolve to turn those New Year resolutions into reality.

John Miller

FITNESS INDUSTRY CREDENTIALS - Thursday January 6th 2010

2011-01-10T22:30:00.000-08:00

In the fitness business we shouldn't fall into the trap of complicating the simple, making the cheap expensive and being judged by our qualifications. That would make us like the medical industry which is the last bastion of the highly qualified and highly ineffective. The heath of Australians continues to get worse, despite the medical industry being protected to the tune of $100B (yep, that $100,000,000,000) each year.

Teaching and motivating people to keep themselves fit and healthy is neither rocket nor medical science. In fact it's so easy that most of the people working in this industry worked it out for themselves and are mad keen to pass their advice on.

With apologies to Alexander Pope, a little learning is definitely not a bad thing, but the evidence suggests that too much education may well be.

It does not take a lot of training to grasp the principles of how to diagnose and treat some of the major causes of metabolic and musculo-skeletal dysunction. In this respect we are streets ahead of the medical industry where huge amounts of time spent in education churns out graduates who lack the ability to diagnose the cause of these dysfunctions and are thereby more than likely to prescribe a drug to mask a symptom, rather than getting people to do the things themselves which restore poor function to good.

It's just time we told the world about it.

We will be recognised for our ability to produce favourable outcomes, not by our certificates.

We are just scratching the surface. Our future will be in becoming recognised as primary health care centres for the treatment of the metabolic and musculo-skeletal dysfunctions.

If you reckon you're up to it, start touting for the sort of business that directs people with metabolic and musculo-skeletal dysfunction into your centre, rather than into a surgery or pharmacy. You may have to modify your programs to suit them.

If you're not yet up to it, start educating yourself to the point where you are.

It won't take people long to feel better and recognise that they're better off keeping themselves fit, rather than swallowing pills. It will save them money.

If you're feeling bold you'll also make a difference to people with some of the psychological dysfunctions, particularly depression, where 12 months of regular vigorous exercise stands head and shoulders above 12 months of Prozac.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and keep in mind that the chances of Fitness Australia supporting you in this quest for greater status of our industry is remote.

On the track
Went to the gym.

John Miller

www.fitandhealthyonline.com

www.crookback.com.au

www.globalbackcare.com

ASPARTAME - Wednesday January 5th 2011

2011-01-06T02:34:00.000-08:00

Mercola is also hot on aspartame, the artificial sweetener. Here's what he has to say.

'There are over 92 different health side effects associated with aspartame consumption including brain tumors, birth defects, diabetes, emotional disorders and epilepsy/seizures. Further, when aspartame is stored for long periods of time or kept in warm areas it changes to methanol, an alcohol that converts to formaldehyde and formic acid, which are known carcinogens.'

From my own experience it causes itchiness.

If you want to know more, just go to www.mercola.com and search for 'aspartame'. There's stacks of stuff there that obviously hasn't been read by the Minister for Health or the Head of the NH&MRC.

I reckon one of the first challenges for the new Preventive Health Agency is to ban fructose and aspartame from cool drinks.

Actually, to be fair, I understand that Australian soft drinks don't contain a high proportion of HFCS - but I'll check it out. But I certainly know that Coke contains 11% sugar and Fanta 13%. A litre of that a day is going to end up in one place!

The next task is to reduce the sugar content of cool drinks to below 5%.

And that's just for starters.

One the track
Went back up to the grass track at Stromlo this morning. We haven't been there for well over 6 months and it's looking good. Ran for 2 and a half kilometres and then walked another 1.5 for good measure. Calves feeling good.

In the evening Christine and I went to the gym.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and lay off cool drink.

Regards

John Miller

www.fitandhealthyonline.com

HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP - Tuesday January 4th 2011

2011-01-05T22:58:00.000-08:00

For some years now I've been a subscriber to the newsletters of Robert Mercola.

http://www.mercola.com/

Today he forwarded some particularly useful information on the fattening of Americans, principally through the addition of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) to soft (soda) drinks.

Mercola writes:

'... research has shown fructose to be particularly harmful to human health. Unlike excess glucose, which passes through our digestive tract and is excreted, 100 percent of fructose that's consumed is taken up by the liver. Once there, fructose causes increased fat deposition in the abdominal cavity and increased blood levels of triglycerides -- both of which are risk factors for heart disease and diabetes.'

On average, Americans drink around 200 litres of high fructose corn syrup containing soft drink a year which makes it probably the most likely source of obesity.

When is the number one source of calories in the United States, and it is very likely the primary cause of the obesity epidemic.

On the track

No track.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and drink less soft drink. If you're thirsty, drink water.

Regards

John Miller

Achilles tendonitis - Moinday 3rd January 2011

2011-01-05T22:40:00.000-08:00

If you're a runner or competitive sportsperson there's a good chance you may have or have had Achilles tendonitis. It's frustrating in the extreme and hard to overcome - particularly if you want to keep on running.

In 2010 I conducted a study into the cause and treatment of Achilles tenbdonitis. I had first hand experience.

In my case tight calves and weak calves seemed to be the immediate cause - but a tight left buttock and a twisted pelvis also played a significant role in placing too much pressure on my right calf.

I tried a variety of treatments but the best effect was gained by using The Stick and if you follow this link you'll be able to read more about it and purchase this essential piece of equipment.

http://www.globalbackcare.com/back-pain-relief-products/index.html

I've also tried a magnet strap, and think ( I say 'think' advisedly) that that may have helped.

Over Christmas I noticed that wearing thongs with a higher than normal heel brought relief to tight calves.

You can read more about it on this link.

http://www.globalbackcare.com/achilles-tendon-pain/index.html

On the track
Out with the boys this morning. Just walking, but it's better to have walked than not to have walked at all.

Weight - 85.4 Kg.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and remember if you want to get on top of Achilles tendonitis it's going to take a multi-modal approach - The Stick, icing, flexibility exercises and the magnet strap.

John Miller
http://www.globalbackcare.com/achilles-tendon-pain/index.html

lower back pain- January 2nd 2011

2011-01-05T22:21:00.000-08:00

There's a plague of lower back pain. In fact it is a plague and from what I see on the internet and in chat rooms and forums few people can pinpoint the cause and few people have a good grasp of what they need to do to restore poor function to good.

The medical industry is making a killing. In the USA it costs upwards of $90,000 for a back operation. That's gouging.

The pity is that the radiologists and medical practitioners are poorly equipped to diagnose the cause of the problem which, in a nutshell is a body that's out of alignment. And as Newton might have said, a body that's out of alignment will stay out of alignment unless acted upon by a force.

That force is a regime of simple strengthening and loosening exercises. It's pretty simple really and takes a few hours a night on the floor.

A few hours you say? Well maybe not that long but certainly long enough to complete a set of exercises that will loosen of calf, hamstring and buttock muscles and get your pelvis back into better alignment.

Think of it like this. As likely as not , over the years you haven't had a regular and systematic strength and flexibility training program. Because of that, your pelvis and vertebrae have gradually moved out of alignment. The big question is, 'Would you be prepared to play catch up for a couple of months?'

You'd be a mug if you didn't answer in the affirmative.

Travelled home from Newcastle today after spending an evening with brother Geoff and his wife Christine. Geoff's a metallurgist (rtd) but with a keen interest in health, particularly metabolic health and in the months ahead I'll let you in on some of his insights. Not many people are treating Old Timers disease as a symptom of metabolic dysfunction. Being a metabolic dysfunction there's a reasonable chance that it's either diet or exercise related.

On the track
No track today, travelling.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if you're suffering from low back pain go to www.globalbackcare.com If you live in Canberra give me a call on (02) 6288 7703.

Regards

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.,com
www.crookback.com.au

HAPPY NEW YEAR January 1st 2011

2011-01-05T22:04:00.000-08:00

I'm back.

Last blog, 20th June.

Twelve months ago I promised myself I'd blog every day for a year. Didn't quite make it. Got to six months the ran out of puff. Started helping Christine renovate her son's home, plus travelled with work and the rest as they say is history. However the physicality of the hard yakka at the house did wonders for my upper body. I enjoyed the opportunity to be involved in vigorous physical work for 3 months.

I promised myself I'd lose 10Kg. Lost 3.

Didn't exercise as much due to the physical work on the house at Hacket, but kept up the three mornings a week with the boys.

Was plagued with sore Achilles and calves, but hopefully have managed to get on top of it.

Spent a lot of time toward the end of the year working on the www.globalbackcare website with webmeister Gavin. We reckon we'll crack the internet code this year. I'm really pleased with the way we work together.

As I write Christine and I are in Ballina coming back from Christmas in Noosa with daughter Lisa her husband Ian and the two little fellas Jackson and Harry - where it bucketed down most of the time.

This years goals
Let's set the weight loss at 8 kg. I'd be happy with that.

Internet mastery with the Global Back Care and Fit and Healthy Online Sites working smoothly: high search rankings for key words thereby attracting huge search volume, building our list, selling our own products as well as those of affiliates.

On the track
No track today. Slept in and then drove to Newcastle.

HEALTH REFORM #5 - Thursday 17th June 2010

2010-06-20T06:54:00.000-07:00

Health Reform # 5 is working out how to get doctors to charge less for their services. Some of the fees, particularly for specialists are just rapacious.

This is a highly protected, greedy, elitist profession. The greater the level of protection the higher their fees.

I went to the dermatologist the other day for a skin complaint. She picked it immediately as psoriasis which I'd inherited from my mother. She wrote out a script for some waxy stuff that calmed down in 3 days what my doctor couldn't treat for over a year. The fee, $175 for 15 minutes. A drover's dog could have done what she did - with a bit of practice. That's not bad dough it is? Just add it up, per day, per week, per month, per year. It's definitely an income that's not commensurate with the service delivered.

(Just don't get me started oln what my dentist charged to pull a tooth the other day. $560 for 40 minutes in the chair. Add that up.)

Changing the definition of primary health care and opening up primary health care treatment to other professional groups is probably the best way to bring about a reduction in medical costs. Nurses, fitness practitioners, pharmacists and naturopaths are obvious choices.

The second way to do it is to let medical graduates loose into surgeries after 5 years of study. If they don't know how to diagnose or treat a particular illness they can send their customer to someone more experienced. As likely as not they will send them to a fitness practitioner, pharmacist, nurse or naturopath.

Maybe doctors should do their first couple of years of practice in a surgery with someone a bit more experienced than themselves. Different practitioners will have different specialities. They'll be able to spread the work amongst themselves.

You don't need 10 years of study to fix a crook back, or write out a certificate because someone has a cold.

Support for fitness practitioners, nurses and naturopaths in private practice will deprive a lot of doctors of the work they've been doing, much of it ineptly. Goodness knows what they learn in medical school these days.

They'll have to smarten themselves up and lower their prices to maintain the payments on the Mercs.

On the track
No track.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and don't work so hard on the weekend that you have trouble raising a sweat for the rest of the week.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

HEALTH REFORM 4 - Wednesday 16th June 2010

2010-06-20T06:35:00.000-07:00

Health Reform #4 is amending the medical insurance legislation and establish a compulsory first party medical insurance levee based on people's income and their level of fitness.

On top of this people may choose to insure themselves against the gap between what the medical practitioners charge and what the government is willing to pay on their behalf.

Medical costs have reached 10% of GDP which means the starting price for the Medicare tax should be 10%.

Let's be realistic and make it 5%.

Take off 1% if you're close to your ideal weight. Under 25% fat for men and 35% fat for women

Take off 1 percent if you don't smoke.

Take off 1% if you're fit. You can run 35 x 20m laps in 5 minutes and do 20 situps and 20 pressups and 20 squats.

That brings down your compulsory, first party health insurance to 2%, thereby enabling the government to subsidize some of your medical costs and some of the costs of those unable to look after themselves.

This is the easy way to encourage people to keep themselves fit and healthy to the best of their ability. How much they pay becomes a choice.

It gives people and incentive to work on their fitness.

It gives fit and healthy people a reward for effort and pays for their gym membership. At the moment they subsidize the fat and lazy. That's not fair.

Sound easy? You betcha.

On the track
Out with the boys. Still sluggish.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and save yourself a poultice in Medicare fees; keep yourself in good shape, and what every you do, don't smoke.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

HEALTH REFORM 3 - Tuesday 15th June 2010

2010-06-20T06:24:00.000-07:00

Health reform 3 is getting people fit and healthy.

We don't have a $100B medical problem in this country, it's a $100B fitness problem.

The easy part is giving .

For governments and health bureaucrats it's easy solving fitness problems by giving money to the medical industry to patch people up. The thing they find hard and the thing they steer clear of is encouraging people to keep themselves fit and healthy.

Well I can tell you, it's not all that tough an assignment and I'll tell you how it can be done tomorrow.

On the track
No track. I'm still stuffed from the weekend.

In the meantime stay tuned, until tomorrow, when all will be revealed.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

HEALTH REFORM 2 - Monday 14th June 2010

2010-06-20T06:09:00.000-07:00

The Rudd Labor Governbment is trumpeting its recent healthfare initiatives as the greatest reform of the medical system since the beginning of Medicare in 1975.

That's bunkum. What's been delivered is Medicare 1975, version 35. All that's happened is the medical industry has gained another $10B in protection and more ambulances are being sent round to the bottom of the cliff.

The second great health reform challenge is to work out how to look after those who can't look after themselves and at the same time stop those who can look after themselves but don't from jumping on the gravy train.

A week or so ago I said that the Commonwealth Government is spending nearly 20% of its budget on healthfare. The states are spending close to 25%. Most of the money is being spent on people who are quite capable of looking after themselves and paying for their own medical treatment.

Hospitals are full to over flowing by people in just plain bad shape and people who can afford to insure themselves against a medical emergency.

Until the Governments of Australia work out how to deal with that there is no such thing as health reform.

On the track
Out with the boys in the freezing cold. Didn't have the energy to raise more than a walk this morning. Do you know I can't keep up with them walking. I can run faster, but can't keep up while walking. I just let them get ahead and then take a short cut. I'm on my own - but it's good thinking time.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and keep yourself in good nick.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

HARD YAKKA - Sunday 14th of June 2010

2010-06-20T06:00:00.000-07:00

The second round at Cameron's place.

Yesterday Cameron forced me to stop the chainsaw there was so much rubbish lying around. He said it would take a skip to get rid of all the stuff on the front lawn.

This morning, Christine and I bundled all of it onto the ute before he got there.

Kids of today don't know what hard work is. No-one's every showed them what men and bullocks can do.

By the end of the day and after 4 trips to the dump everything was all cleaned up. Skip, my arse!

Somebody said it couldn't be done and he with a chuckle replied
That maybe it couldn't but he would be one who wouldn't say so 'til he tried.
So he buckled right in with a trace of a grin on his face if he worried he hid it
And he started to sing as he tacked the thing that couldn't be done, and he did it.

On the track
That was the track.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and don't let someone half your age tell you what you can't do.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

TREATMENT FOR DEPRESSION - Saturday 13th June 2010

2010-06-20T05:48:00.000-07:00

Gurdjieff said that it you're depressed one of the best things you can do is get out in the garden.

I think that's true.

Well, I'm not depressed but I had a great day out in the garden today working like buggery up at Christine's son's place in Hackett.

I used to help my Dad in the garden when I was a kid. He worked on Saturday morning. He'd come home, have lunch, get changed and go out into the garden. He was raised on a farm and turned gardening on a quarter acre block into an artform.

Life seemed to be one continuous routing of mucking stuff out of the chook house and spreading it on the garden and then barrowing new dirt back in it's place.

At the end of the day we'd often go down to the beach to get the chooks some seaweed and cuttlefish bones to scrape their beaks on.

There's nothing quite as satisfying as hosing down the paths and the tools at the end of the day and looking back to survey your work.

My Dad knew how to work hard

A few weeks ago I ran amok with the chainsaw cutting an old creeper and a tree off the carport.

Today involved more chainsawing, putting the rubbish on the ute and taking it to the dump.

Christine and Cameron got stuck into it as well. It was a great day.

Jeez I slept well.

On the track
The track today was the garden.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if you feel depressed get out into the garden.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

HALF WAY THERE - Friday 12th June 2010

2010-06-20T05:40:00.000-07:00

I can't say it's been easy but the Blogarithm started on the 12th of December. It's now the 12th of June. Half way there. That's a milestone.

On the track
No track today. Had to get up very early and drive to Sydney. Came back very late.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and remember that nothing in the world can take the place of persistence.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

HEALTH REFORM 1 - Thursday 10th June 2010

2010-06-20T05:24:00.000-07:00

35 years ago I attended a lecture by futurologist Fred Emery where he said that one of the challenges for the recreation industry was how to run down gracefully sports that had had their heyday.

Now I don't know which sports he was referring to, but two sports that seem to be on the decline are the two rugby codes. I don't think many people find them appealing enough to actually play the game. Soccer seems to be on the increase in terms of participation by young people but it's a shit of a sport; you can't score, watching it is like watching pain dry and the A league competition is such a second-rate competition it has to be played in summer.

There are some sports that a very small that keep getting propped up by the Australian Olympic Committee. A lot of them could hold their annual championship in a phone box.

In the health arena health reform challenge #1 is how to gracefully run down an inefficient and increasingly ineffective medical industry.

The type of medical practice the governments of Australia are throwing $100B at each year is just not the health practice that people need in a sedentary culture, where most of the heroic diseases have been banished and most of the body system dysfunctions are personally generated.

Continuing to pay doctors to fix fitness problems with medical and pharmaceutical solutions is a complete and utter waste of money. Protecting the medical industry only encourages them to practice more and more junk medicine, particularly at the local level - and to put their prices up.
The solution is breaking down the notion of primary care and including more professional groups in the definition.

On the track
No track. Living on yesterday's glory.

In the meantime stay tuned highly tuned and keep your fingers crossed that as the protection of the medical industry gradually declines the protection of the fitness industry increases.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

WHAT'S OLD - Wednesday 9th June

2010-06-20T05:11:00.000-07:00

It never ceases to amaze me the continued call on public funds to meet the rising cost of medical services because of the increasing age profile of the community.

There are a few things that come to mind here.

1. What's old? I asked Adolf, at 83 the second oldest member at Fit and Healthy, (the gym I used to run) whether he thought he was old. He gave an emphatic 'NO'.

2. Getting older is not a cause of poor health. Being older doesn't mean you have to be in poorer health than you were when you were younger. OK, there will be a bit of wear and tear, that's normal, but chronic poor health, is by and large preventable. Certainly it doesn't mean that once you get old you can expect to be sickly all the time. The fact that some older people are sicker than some younger people has got nothing to do with age. I keep telling people that the older they are the longer they've had to train!

3. Why have succeeding governments sought to accept such a large public responsibility for individual poor health, when most of the poor health around is privately generated and privately preventable? This seems a bizarre proposition. I support the public role for the support of some poor health. Of course the best thing governments have done to improve health over the last 100 years is to improve sanitation.

The definition of old
Sooner or later the Government has to provide a definition of what's old? Is it 65, 70, 75, 80?Adolf didn't feel old at 80.

The main generators of health problems at any age are lack of vigorous physical activity, an inappropriate diet and an inability to manage the stress of one's internal and external environments. To attribute the blame for poor health on getting older is drawing a particularly long bow.

We live in the golden age, where more and more people are being blessed with the conditions of life that foster and support the ability to grow older. Good government, technology and affluence have enabled this to happen, quite apart from what we do for ourselves. If people never had it so good in Harold McMillan's England, they've certainly got it better in the Australia that's been handed down through the generations of governments from Mr Menzies to Mr Rudd.

Let's not spoil our old age by being unhealthy.

On the track
Out with the boys.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and age healthily.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

65 THE NEW 40 - Tuesday 8th June 2010

2010-06-20T04:20:00.000-07:00

Today I turned 65 and I have to say I don't feel like I'm 65.

Ok, I'm a bit greyer, balder and fatter than I'd like to be. I can't do much about the grey or the balding./

At the beginning of the Blogarithm I was 87 Kg. On the 13th of December it was 86.6Kg. Today I'm 84.8. Didn't even lose 2 Kg in all that time. At 26% fat, that's way to high and I've given myself a fail. I've let myself down. I eat too much.

One of my goals was to get down to 78 Kg and fit into the trouser I bought in London seven or so years ago. It's still a goal. I've let myself down.

But on the track today here's what happened.

40 minutes on the stepper for 40 minutes at level 8 all over 140 bpm; 617 calories and 817 steps. Give that a pass.

Situps 65, presups, 50 and squats 50. I'll give that a pass as well, but at 65 I saw Tom Hafey do 100 situps and 100 pressups. That was 10 years ago. I imagine he can still do them.

I would have liked to do the 5 minute, 20 metre run, but I keep tearing my right calf muscle. The good news is that using The Stick has got rid of my Achilles tendonitis. That's very good news. Now I'm working on the calf.

All in all I give myself a 6/10. Fail.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned an stop eating so much. You;re a disgrace.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

NAPLAN - Monday 7th June 2010

2010-06-20T03:34:00.000-07:00

The Deputy Prime Minister and minister45 for Education is puffing her chest out as kids around Australia put their heads down and do their NAPLAN tests.

I had to Google what 'NAPLAN' stands for - National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy.

It's typical, pick on something professors of education and nerds around the country would feel was a pushover.

They don't give a stuff about art, wit, humour, physical activity, personal development, music, dance, woodwork, cooking, ... Neither do the teachers they train not the principals who supervise them.

It's why by the time kids reach the last year of high school they're dull and depressed.

How good an education do you think school children are getting if those who teach them do not have a good command of the basic physical skills, like, running, jumping, throwing, catching, kicking, skipping, rolling, hanging, climbing, swimming ...

Here's the NAPPE - National Assessment Program - PhysEd - a list of some of the key motor skills that I reckon form a basic foundation of motor skill development and physical fitness. They’re the sorts of activities that kids at age 12 and teachers of any age can do, if they’re reasonably well trained.

Run your eye over the list of skills and see how many of them you can still do. If you can make the grade, I’ll take my hat off to you. If the teachers you know can make the grade I’ll take my hat off to them as well.

Juggle three balls

Skip with a rope

Do a good 30 seconds worth of double under skips.

Run 40, 20m laps in 5 minutes

Do 20 good situps

Do 20 good pressups

Do 5 good chinups

Sitting down, reach forward and get your wrists past your toes

Sit down and stand up 10 times in 30 seconds

Keep a yo yo going up and down for 30 seconds

Throw a ball 20m

Hop 20m on one leg, and then the other

Catch a tennis ball from 10m

Throw a tennis ball up in the air and clap 10 times before it comes down – and catch it.

Put a bean bag between your heels and kick it over your head

Swim 50 metres in less than a minute.

Duck dive and swim 5 metres under water

Dive into the water from a height of a metre- or more

Swing on a horizontal bar

Swing across a monkey bar.

Put one leg over the horizontal bar and swing up into a sitting position

Hang by your legs from a horizontal bar - swing and land on your feet.

Pat a tennis ball with your hand

Pat a ball with a wooden bat or tennis racquet, flat on and also on the side.

Crab walk for 10 metres

Lie on your back and put your feet up over your head and onto the floor behind you

Do a forward roll

Do a backward roll

Do a frog balance

Do a cartwheel

Do a 5 second handstand

Hit a ball against a wall for 30 seconds using a bat – forehand and backhand from 5 metres

Climb up a rope

Ride a bike, no hands ...

And there must be dozens more things that kids ought to be able to do that suggest fitness and motor skill proficiency. If you can think of some, send me an email.

On the trackOut with the boys at 6.45.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and let me know how you go on the NAPPE.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

YOUTUBE FOR EXERCISES - Sunday 6th June 2010

2010-06-20T03:11:00.000-07:00

Arthur C Clarke said something to the effect that whatever you think about the future it will be utterly fantastic. He also said, ‘Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.’

Well the future is here in the form of YouTube and it definitely is utterly fantastic and magical.

And not only is it YouTube but it’s YourTube because of its ability to entertain and inform you.
With respect to back pain stretches it has a whole host of exercises that you can troll through and then do on a regular and systematic basis to get your back back into better shape.

Once you’ve cottoned on to the fact that it’s muscles that move bones out of alignment and that the cause of the pain is rarely at the site of the pain you can start looking for exercises that will strengthen and loosen those muscles that are the cause of your pain.

YouTube is an incredible online community that so willingly gives of it’s time, effort and thought to help other people. It says a lot for the generosity of mankind.

It’s built on the maxim that giving comes before getting. Sure, some of the videos lead to money changing hands but that’s a fair exchange for information you think is worthwhile. A lot of it comes from the goodness of a heart or some professional or personal passion. There just seems to be a heck of a lot of people out there wanting to share their knowledge.

It takes time and effort to set up the camera and show someone a set of back pain stretches that, in all likelihood will relieve your back pain. Then it has to be downloaded and uploaded. The reward in many cases is just good, old fashioned, personal satisfaction. It’s quite extraordinary.

It’s YourTube because you put out by going there to get information. You’re putting in time and effort, so you deserve to be rewarded. The rewards are huge. No more back pain.

I was on YouTube the other day looking for back pain stretches. Sheesh, I could have spent weeks there. It was like shopping in an oriental bazaar; going so far down streets and ally ways I got lost and couldn’t find my way back to where I started.

Then I ducked over to look for hip stretches; same thing. If your hip’s playing up, search for the ‘Fire Hydrant’ mobility exercise.

Knee problems anyone? I saw this PhysEd guy from California walking backwards on a treadmill with the elevation set on high. It looked a bit hairy, but it’s worth a try.

It’s a fascinating journey. I bookmarked a few sites, wrote to a few people to let them know I admired their work and looked at a range of gadgets and devices.

The other thing I like about YouTube is that if someone has found an exercise useful and bothered to upload a video of themselves doing it, there’s a fair chance that it might do you some good as well.

If you think you’ve got all the answers, think again. Go to YouTube.

It’s utterly fantastic.

On the track
On the stepper, 40 m inutes at 140 bpm for 593 calories and 785 steps.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and keep stretching those hamstring and buttock muscles.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

THE TEA YOU HAVE BEFORE TEA - Saturday 5th June 2010

2010-06-20T03:07:00.000-07:00

It’s like this. You leave work tired and hungry. You have to pick up a few things from the supermarket.

Have you noticed that you never go to the supermarket on a full stomach? And being a while since you had something to eat there’s always a bit of slack in your trousers.

Anyway, you push through the turnstile and blow me down, if there aren’t any baskets there. Every second time I go shopping I have to scrounge around the checkouts and bring a stack of baskets back to where they should be.

You do the right thing. You start in the fruit and vegetable section, move round to the fish, drop a bottle of peach tea into your basket, load up with a few groceries and then think ‘Hmmmm, I could do with something on the way home.’

You sneak back to the vegetables section and get a handful of cashews.
Now nuts are good for you. If you look at cashews, they possess herbal health benefits that include killing bacteria and germs, stopping diarrhea, drying secretions, increasing the libido, and reducing fever, blood sugar, blood pressure muscle spasms, migraine headaches, tension, soreness and fatigue. They help reduce gallstones, facilitate the utilization of iron and the elimination of free radicals.
The big problem is they pack a powerful energy punch. Cashews are around 2,400 kilojoules (kJ) per 100gms, which is about the size of the handful you scooped into the plastic bag. To put things in perspective, depending on your size and the amount of physical activity you get each day, you need between 7,000 or 8,000 a day.

Be that as it may, you’re as hungry as a horse and 100 grams doesn’t seem all that much as you navigate the lid on the box, and dip the shovel in. Two cashews fall on the floor. You look around. No-one’s watching. You stoop down, pick them up and stuff them into your mouth; can’t let good food go to waste.

You’ve cleaned the full 100gms up by the time you’re half way home and stick the empty bag under the seat to hide the evidence.

It’s your turn to cook tea. You’re still hungry. The smell of food in the supermarket and the thought of food at home has made you even hungrier. You could eat the crotch out of a low flying duck.

But first, before you get started, you need a few Ritz cracker biscuits just to tide you over. (They’re called Ritz because no-one ever had 1 Rit.) Now, whilst Ritz cracker biscuits have 2118 kJ /100gms, the redeeming feature is that each one is very small. But that only provides you with all the more reason to get through 20 of them while you’re cutting up the vegetables. There’s around 600kJ.

And they do taste better with some dip. Some of the dips contain 2000 kJ/100 grams. On this night you pull back and only have half the container, there’s 1000kJ, and all of which raises a thirst; and after all it’s been a long hard slog at the office. You’ve come home tired and depressed so the next thing you reach for is a central nervous system depressant. Duh!

The Heart Foundation reckons you’ll benefit by having a glass of wine a day; you interpret that as one’s good, two’s better and three’s best. Today it’s mid week so you decide to go easy, and restrict yourself to two glasses. A regular glass contains about 300kJ, your glasses contain 400 kJ. All up 800 kJ.

So if you want to know why your trousers are so tight they’re ring-barking you, let’s add up the kilojoules you’ve had before you’ve had your tea:

• cashews 2400
• cracker biscuits 600
• dip 1000
• wine 800

Total 4,800 kJ

On the track
Out on the stepper this morning. Started a bit late so only got in 35 minutes all at level 6: 510 calories and 657 steps.

Then off to the gym. Christine and I are back in the gym, which feels good after an extended break. We took It easy - otherwise you have to pay for it tomorrow.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and eat and apple on your way home.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

Epilogue. I forgot to tell you about the Cherry Ripe that someone put into the basket at the supermarket. That was an extra 1500kJ after tea.

I CAN'T HELP YOU - Friday 4th June 2010

2010-06-20T01:51:00.000-07:00

Despite what the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare says, the health of Australians is getting worse.

You know that because the medical budget continues to escalate at more than 10% a year.

The Commonwealth Government is allocating nearly 20% of its budget to protect the medical industry. The States are spending around 25%. That's why there's no money for infrastructure and people have to pay to drive on roads they pay for every time they fill up their tanks. It's time people woke up to the fact that you can't have a free run into the hospital and a free ride on a tollway.

Meanwhile surgeries are pack to the rafters with people who are either given poor advice and keep coming back or people who are given good advice and keep coming back.

Spare a though for the good clients of poor doctors. They take their (junk) medicine in good faith. Their condition worsens. They keep coming back.

Spare a though for the doctors with poor customers who don't take their doctor's advice and keep coming back.

If doctors refused to write junk medical prescriptions for people suffering from personally-induced metabolic, musculo-skeletal and psychological dysfunctions and told customers who don't listen to them, 'I can't help you, you have to help yourself', then maybe we'd start to take more notice of them.

But they don't.

On the track
Out with the boys for the thrice-weekly walk/run.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and help yourself to stay in exceptionally good nick.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

PREVENTIVE HEALTH - Thursday 3rd June 2010

2010-06-20T01:14:00.000-07:00

The big buzz-phrase in Australia at the moment is 'preventive health' (for chrissakes), medical speak for doctors telling people to exercise more, smoke less, eat better and lay off the grog.

But just ask yourself, 'How do you prevent health?'

What is really meant by the term is 'preventive medicine' but this is the term that dare not speak its name. What doctor is going to promote preventive medicine when it will reduce the number of people traipsing through their rooms?

The problem with surgeries is that the more time people spend in them the worse their health becomes. Small problems become big problems.

The health of the community is getting worse because doctors know nothing about fitness and because of that they're forced to practice junk medicine - where they prescribe drugs to mask symptoms rather than prescribing treatments which restore poor function to good.

Most health problems these days are fitness problems. Fitness problems cannot be solved by medical solutions.

The fitness industry has gone to ground.

Most of the health promoting treatments require time and effort on the part of the surgeree. Most of them don't want to expend that time or effort. They conspire with the doctor to take the escalator down to an even lower level of health, fitness and wellbeing.

Meanwhile doctors keep giving the preventive health sermon.

But guess who listens? I'll tell you who listens, nobody. That's because everyone knows a sermon is the price you have to pay to get a prescription.

All you want is for the pain to go away as quickly as possible.

The doctor is quite happy to go along with this charade.

In fact it's like this. There's a dark room with a table and three chairs. Behind the table there's a bloke saying to himself, 'How can I get rid of this bastard as quick as possible and still keep up the payments on my Merc.

On the other side of the table is a bloke saying, 'How can I get away from this bastard in the shortest possible time without paying anything.'

They collude with each other. The doctor reaches for the pad. The customer snatches the prescription off the table and heads for the chemist.

In this country the third chair is occupied by a dill with a cheque book, the Minister for Health who's quite happy to pick up part of the tab for this tawdry exchange.

So there you have it. Doctor happy, customer gone in 7 minutes flat and waiting room full to over flowing.

Customer happy, got out of there in seven minutes flat with a prescription to relieve the pain.

Minister for Health happy, electorate thinks she is a jolly good fellow.

But back to the preventive health sermon.

You just roll your eyes and let it pass in one ear and out the other.

On the track
On the stepper this morning. 40 minutes all over 140 bpm, for 562 calories and 744 steps. That feels better.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and move heaven and earth to keep yourself out of the surgery.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

GP'S SWING ON GOVERNMENT TIT - Wednesday June 2nd 2010

2010-06-20T01:03:00.000-07:00

Saw an advert in the paper

'Grants supporting after hours GP services.'

You'd reckon if you were running a business and people wanted to you open after hours you'd jump at it, particularly a business where you earn $400,000 a year.

The health bureaucrats should spend more time at McDonalds and Woolworths to see how it's done.

According to the advert, 100 new grants are up for grabs up to a maximum of $100,000.

That's not bad dough it is, particularly when it's on top of whatever it is the doctor is getting for a consultation - $80 for 15 minutes?

No wonder the Commonwealth Government is spending $40,000,000,000 more this coming year than it earns.

It's called robbing the poor to give to the rich.

I reckon they ought to scrap the idea of a super profits tax on the mining industry and impose it on the medical industry.

On the track
Out with the boys for a walk/run at 6.45 in the freezing cold.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and put in for a grant to open your fitness centre before 9am and and after 5pm.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

FITNESS AUSTRALIA BACKS DIETITIANS OVER FITNESS PRACTITIONERS - Tuesday 1st June 2010

2010-06-19T22:39:00.000-07:00

I forgot to mention yesterday that while the Fitness Australia bloke was telling me fitness practitioners weren't qualified to run CrookBack Clinics, he says to me that they've also put a stop to fitness practitioners running diet seminars.

This was because Fitness Australia had done a deal with the dietitian industry - who are judged by Fitness Australia to have all the answers about eating wisely.

They don't.

How on earth could you trust what comes out of the mouth of a profession that is sponsored by Nestles and Kelloggs, two of the largest manufacturers of junk food in the world - let alone what they're encouraging people to put into their mouths.

This is the industry that still tells people to stuff themselves with bread and pasta and parrots on about the glycemic index and Barry and Martin Rice.

These are the people that encourage you to eat more chocoilate because it's got a low glycemic index.

These are the people playing a firm hand in causing not fixing the problem of obesity.

Consider this.

The National Nutrition Guidelines recommends that people 'eat plenty of cereals (including breads, rice, pasta and noodles), preferably wholegrain)'. They don't say what 'plenty' means, but one set of guidelines recommends men eat 24 slices of bread a day. Can you believe that? A loaf of bread a day keeps the doctor away! Hello!

If you don't believe me click on this link: -

http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/_files_nhmrc/file/publications/synopses/n31.pdf

A serve of cereals is 2 slices of bread. Men between 19 and 60 should have between 6 and 12 serves a day.

You'd have to be living in LaLa land to make that sort of recommendation.

If you want to balloon out, follow the NH&MRC cereal guidelines. Most people living in the Western suburbs do. That's why half of them are 40Kg over weight. If you don't believe me, just go to any shopping centre on pay Thursday and watch.

30% of the people I see are suffering from flour induced headaches and a lack of energy. Their doctor tells them they're depressed. The more bread and pasta they eat the worse they feel, the fatter they get. Their blood pressure goes up. Their doctor sends them over to the chemists.

They don't teach this stuff at dietitians school!

These are also the people who wrote the NH&MRC guidelines which say, 'Development of type 2 diabetes does not appear to be related to ingestion of sugar or other carbohydrates: it is predominantly influenced by genetics, body weight and lifestyle factors.'

If eating flour and sugar isn't a 'lifestyle Factor' what is?

You can read more about this crap on this link -

http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/_files_nhmrc/file/publications/synopses/n33.pdf

The guidelines read like a stream of essays cobbled together like a string of sausages from a series of essays for Diet 101. You're meant to be impressed by the list of references but it's the same old, same old selective evidence stuff from the diet research industry beavering away in the bowels of the sheltered workshops for the academically gifted.

Just about everything the NH&MRC writes about healthy living is crap. The back care stuff certainly is, along with the diet stuff and anything to do with depression.

The dietitians are the people who advise the National Heart Foundation to give the tick to bread and pies.

As an industry it's a joke. It makes you want to roll your eyes through to the back of your neck. The fitness industry doesn't have to take any lead from these people.

You can read all about this dietitian nonsense on this link: -

http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/hourglassdiet/index.htm

I think I'll put the Hourglass Diet up as a CEC course and see what happens. Some skinny dietitian with the appetite of a sparrow will give it a right royal shit-bagging, just you watch.

Fitness Australia must think fitness practitioners are a bunch of cretins. No wonder the industry is wallowing in the health backwater.

On the track.
No track, slack - and freezing cold.

Christine went to a conference and bought me a copy of Mark McKeon's book 'Every Day Counts.' (Mark is a former coach of Collingwood.) Apparently not every day counts, you can have a day or two off a week to recover. Today I must have recovered.

In the meantime stay tuned and eat more bread and pasta.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

FITNESS AUSTRALIA DUDDS FITNESS PRACTITIONERS - Monday 31st May 2010

2010-06-19T21:08:00.000-07:00

You wouldn't believe this.

I just got word back from Fitness Australia that they won't accept the CookBack Clinic as a program for which fitness practitioners can claim continuing education credits (CEC).

A year ago I sent them off a submission and course outline for a half day program for fitness practitioners, teaching them the CrookBack Clinic methodology.

When 50% of people have some sort of musculo-skeletal dysfunction and when 80% of it relates to low levels of strength and flexibility, my thought was that this would be a good opportunity for the fitness industry to attract people to their centres and start to make an impact.

Plus it would, of course keep people out of surgeries and physio and chiropractic rooms and enable doctors, physios and chiros to get in a round of golf on Wednesday afternoons.

Well, it took four of five months for them to get back to me. I had to ring and ring to get any response from their secretarial staff. Getting none I had to pull rank.

Finally I got the review. Their reviewer had the hide to tell me that fitness practitioners didn't have the authority or qualifications to diagnose anything. That was a doctor's job. I've said before that doctors don't have a clue how to diagnose the cause of musculo-skeletal dysfunction, let alone metabolic and psychological dysfunction. That's why they practice junk medicine.

Their reviewer also queried my qualifications and that fact that they were awarded 40 years ago, and the fact that the CrookBack Clinic course for fitness practitioners was a bit short.

I guessed then that it had been reviewed by a physiotherapist. His or her response (for some reason I suspect it was a her) was that how can you teach someone where to look for the cause of a crook back in a half day (or a day) when people were attending physiotherapy courses for 4 years.

I wrote back in my second submission that maybe physiotherapy courses should be 4 years and one day!

Anyway I seriously revamped my course outline; wrote a new book. It took me a month solid. I had dozens of new diagrams done. I searched the literature about the cause of musculo-skeletal dysfunction and wrote that up as well. (The main cause as identified by the NH&MRC and the Arthritis Foundation is that it comes out of the blue, for chrissakes. They say that back pain is caused by a herniated disc, which is tantamount to saying that a crook back is caused by a crook back. This has to be the vapid of vapids.)

I took out the bits about diagnosing and toned it down to 'looking for clues'. I explained that my qualifications were current (a 2-year diploma from a university is still a diploma from a University) and that I'm a registered fitness practitioner. I also explained that I hadn't been sitting on my arse looking out the window for the last 40 years either.

I expanded the course to a full day.

Anyway, three months after I resubmitted the application I ring up the bloke from Fitness Australia to give him a hurry-up (again) and he tells me it has been knocked back for a second time, and, you guessed it - by a physiotherapist. These are the people mind you who still rub, crunch, vibrate and shock the spot where it hurts.

I said to him, 'Why didn't you get it reviewed by a fitness practitioner?' He couldn't answer that one. What an insult to a profession to get some from outside it to review your work.

On the track
Out with the boys for a walk/run.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned because when I get the written response from Fitness Australia and their physiotherapist reviewer I'm going to stack on one hell of a turn.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

MASTERCHEF- OVERDONE- Sunday 30th May 2010

2010-06-19T00:31:00.000-07:00

I was a bit hard on Gary Mehigan and George Calomaris when i last wrote about Masterchef. They;re good blokes.

I've watched them giving feedback to the contestants, it's always fair and honest. They're appreciative of good work, firm when it's shoddy.

They're good teachers, they love their students and get misty when they have to chuck people off the show.

As for when it's all going to end; I think it will be at exactly the same moment as Matt Preston splits his strided and the buttons on his jacket part company and end up in a bowl of soup on the other side of the kitchen.

On the track
40 minutes of the stepper just about all at level 8. 589 calories and 780 steps.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and ate more, of the right food at the right time.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

RUDD BACK IN HOSPITAL - Saturday 29th May

2010-06-03T15:11:00.001-07:00

He's back - in hospital with a beaming Victorian Premier, John Brumby.

Brumby should be ashamed of himself. He's been dudded by his health bureaucrats and suckered by Rudd for a few hundred million dollars in a grubby self promotion exercise, the upshot of which has been to pour more public money down the medical black hole.

The health of Australians continues to decline in direct and inverse proportion to the degree to which this bloated and inefficient medical industry is protected by Australian governments.

On the track
On the stepper for 40 minutes all at level 8. That's good. 618 calories and 808 steps.

In the meantime stay tuned and keep Kevin Rudd out of hospitals.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

WASTED EFFORT - Friday May 28th 2010

2010-06-03T14:58:00.000-07:00

I had a call from my mate, Graham Dodd today.

We went to University together and did PhysEd - before it had been taken over by Human Movement Science, biomechanics, perceptual motor mechanics and the rest of it. Science has destroyed academic physical education. The simple has become complicated. Graham and could no longer get into university to do a PhysEd course because we're too dumb.

The ability to be a good teacher has little to do with academic achievement in maths and science.

How smart do you have to be to teach children how to kick and throw and catch and how to keep themselves fit for life? Not very.

Looking back we agree our profession had done a dreadful job.

Just about everyone under 60 in this country has had some sort of a PhysEd program when they were at school. They didn't learn much. Look at them, fat, weak and depressed.

There are kids leaving school as I write in just plain dreadful shape. What sort of reflection is that on our profession.

The new national curriculum is going to set out guidelines for PhysEd up to the end of year 10. After that, God knows.

What I do know is that for many kids years 11 and 12 are so stressful it nearly crucifies them. They stop all physical activity just to get through their exams.

Graham and I busted our boilers writing books, running the PhysEd professional association and publishing the Daily Physical Education (DPE) program.

Where is the DPE now - gathering dust on staff room bookshelves.

We should have spent more time with our families.

On the track
Out with the boys for a walk run.

In the meantime stay tuned and don't take yourself seriously.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.crookback.com.au

FITNESS INDUSTRY SUCKS UP TO THE MEDICAL INDUSTRY - Thursday 27th May 2010

2010-06-03T05:59:00.000-07:00

I was reading an article put out by the Fitness Australia - of which I'm a member.

Here they are meant to be supporting and protecting their own industry and they're sucking up to the medical industry and it's preventive health agenda. How you prevent health beggars my imagination. The question Fitness Australia should be focusing on is how to stop people ending up in surgeries. It prompted me to put pen to paper. and send them a note.

It's time Fitness Australia got off it's backside and got the fitness industry firmly placed at the primary health care table.

When most of the people in this country are in just plain dreadful shape the Commonwealth Government has budgeted $57,000,000,000 for medical services in its next budget.

The Government just doesn't get it that you can't solve a fitness problem with a medical solution.

The Preventive Health Task Force is a limp and useless tool. The big money continues to go to the medical industry.

For every person who loses a kilogram, someone else will put on 2.

For every one who can score another lap on the 20m run, another person will score 2 less than they did last time.

For everyone who eats an apple a day, 2 more people will eat a Mars Bar and down a bottle of Coke.

The bulk of the money pledged for sport will end up funding Olympic Sports who could hold their AGM in a phone box.

For every dollar the Government spends funding 'social marketing campaigns to raise national awareness of the risks of obesity' the junk food industry will spend $1,000,000.

This is yet another snow job by the medical industry bureaucrats.

The Fitness Industry has nothing in common with these dills. Ignore them.

Concentrate on

1. getting members of the Fitness Industry recognised as a primary health care providers with all the rebates and perks that the medical industry receives

2. getting people into fitness centres.

3. getting the Government to alter the medical tax levee scales so that fit and healthy people get rebates for keeping themselves in good shape. There has to be an incentive for people to keep themselves fit and healthy.

4. getting the government to subsidize the fitness centre costs of people who are in good shape or getting themselves into good shape.

This preventive health stuff is a side show, a diversion away from the main game - which is fitness professionals being supported in their work of getting people fitter and healthier.

On the track
I don't think there was any track today either. More slack than track.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if you want to prevent health, keep yourself in exceptionally good shape.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

LOWER BACK STRETCHES - Wednesday 26th May 2010

2010-06-03T05:54:00.000-07:00

Talking about the future, Arthur C Clarke said, 'Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.'

Well the future is here in the form of YouTube and it definitely is magical.

If you've got lower back pain and you're looking for back pain stretches I recommend you go to YouTube.

There you'll find a host of exercises that you can troll through and then do on a regular and systematic basis to relieve back pain.

YouTube is not just an entertainment portal, it's an incredible online community that willingly gives of its time, effort and thought to help other people. There just seems to be a lot of people out there wanting to share their knowledge. It says a lot for the generosity of mankind.

At YouTube, there are hundreds of stretching videos that people have taken in bedrooms, offices and fitness centres and then up-loaded, some more professional than others, but all designed to help you restore poor function to good.

Most of the people who submit their videos are from the Yoga or fitness industries. That's because back pain is not a medical problem it's a fitness problem. Many of these people are real experts in the field of musculo-skeletal health, many are unsung heros and you're getting the benefit of their wisdom for free. Most of these people have already helped hundreds of people relieve their back pain. They can help you. It's a fantastic resource.

Self help
What I like about the back pain stretches on YouTube is the fact that all the videos, and there are hundreds of them, promote self help. This fits in with one of the principles I encourage people to adopt and that is; 'it's a big ask expecting to get better by having someone do something to you; sooner or later you have to do something to yourself.'

Once you've cottoned on to the fact that it's muscles that move bones out of alignment and that the cause of the pain is rarely at the site of the pain, you can start looking for exercises that will strengthen and loosen those muscles that are the cause of your pain. Focus on loosening hamstring and buttock muscles and strengthening trunk muscles - front, back and core.

I was on YouTube the other day looking for back pain stretches. Sheesh, I could have spent weeks there. It was like shopping in an oriental bazaar; going so far down streets and ally ways I got lost and couldn't find my way back to where I started.

It's a fascinating journey. I bookmarked a few sites, wrote to a few people to let them know I admired their work. I also looked at a range of gadgets and devices people are using to decompress their vertebrae, loosen tight back muscles and strengthen abdominal muscles.

Many of the exercises to fix back pain come from yoga. I'd bet on them; they've been around for thousands of years. In fact if you're looking for a good set of lower back stretches I'd seriously encourage you to join a yoga class, go a few times a week and spend some of your own time doing the exercises they recommend while you watch TV. The cost will be far less than lining up at the chiropractory every week for a crunch and a rub down.

If you think you've got all the answers on relieving back pain, think again. Go to YouTube.

It's magical.

There's only one catch; the people who've posted the exercises can't do them for you.
In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if someone has found an exercise useful and bothered to upload a video of themselves doing it, there's a fair chance that it might do you some good as well.

On the track
Out with the boys on a walk/run.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and go to YouTube for your lower back stretches.

John Miller

www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

THE GUY IN THE GLASS - Tuesday 25th May 2010

2010-06-03T05:47:00.000-07:00

I found this on Linkedin.

The Guy in the Glass

When you get what you want in your struggle for self,
And the world makes you King for a day,
Then go to the mirror and look at yourself,
And see what that guy has to say.

For it isn't your Father, or Mother, or Wife,
Who judgement upon you must pass.
The feller whose verdict counts most in your life
Is the guy staring back from the glass.

He's the feller to please, never mind all the rest,
For he's with you clear up to the end,
And you've passed your most dangerous, difficult test
If the guy in the glass is your friend.

You may be like Jack Horner and "chisel" a plum,
And think you're a wonderful guy,
But the man in the glass says you're only a bum
If you can't look him straight in the eye.

You can fool the whole world down the pathway of years,
And get pats on the back as you pass,
But your final reward will be heartaches and tears
If you've cheated the guy in the glass.

Dale Wimbrow, The Guy in the Glass

On the track
No track. Read a book saying you shouldn't train every day.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and watch out for that guy in the glass.

John Miller

www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

A NEW HEALTH SYSTEM - Monday 24th May 2010

2010-06-03T05:17:00.000-07:00

I'm a member of Linkedin, an internet directory.

Crace Couter, also a member asked this question:

‘I need to catch up on timely healthcare reform information and speak intelligently about it quickly. What reliable and updated resources can someone recommend to me that I can quickly digest (i.e. Cliff Notes)?’

My reply
The chances of finding timely health care information is remote. Most people equate the word 'health' with the word 'medical'. You'll find stacks of stuff about the medical industry. The medical bureaucracy, the medical research industry and the medical commentariat are burgeoning with hangers on all making a living out of bolstering a bloated, inefficient, greedy and expensive medical system. The interest of this industry in promoting good health is practically zilch. Over the last 30 years the medical industry has presided over the greatest decline in health since Adam.

The greatest of the health challenges are health-related, not medical-related.

The big challenges are:

1. How to get people to take responsibility for their own health, fitness and wellbeing.

2. How to get people to keep themselves fit and healthy to the best of their ability.

3. How to gracefully run down a medical industry that is based on a 20th Century germ theory not the theory of personally-generated body-system dysfunction.

4. How to stop people from going to doctors for things doctors can't fix.

5. How to reduce the protection of a bloated, inefficient and expensive medical system.

6. Recognition of the fact that it's a big ask expecting to stay healthy without being fit.

7. Recognition that you can't solve a 21st Century fitness problem with a 20th Century medical solution.

8. Recognition that most of the health problems of the western world are personally-generated body system dysfunctions.

9. Most health problems are related to a lack of physical activity and junk diet.

10. Recognition that the three great dysfunctions, metabolic, musculo-skeletal and psychological are not medical conditions - until they reach a tipping point of grave and irreparable dysfunction.

On the track
Out with the boys for an early morning walk/run.

In the meantime stay tuned highly tuned and do whatever it takes to steer clear of the medical industry.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

MASTERCHEFS - MASTERSIZED - Sunday May 23rd

2010-06-02T22:50:00.000-07:00

If this country is the second fattest country on earth then no wonder.

The nation’s top chefs aren’t providing much in the way of leadership. On the contrary they’re leading by poor example. They’re overweight. It’s sending the wrong message to suburbia that when you cook good food be prepared to stack on weight.

We’re big Masterchef watchers in our family, though as far as I’m concerned the welcome is starting to wear thin. By the rate at which they keep chucking contestants off the show it looks as though we’ll still glued to the set in September.

Good, wholesome food shouldn’t fatten people up. When the nation’s chefs are fat you know that they’re either eating too much of a good thing, cooking the wrong sort of food, or stuffing themselves with fat, flour and sugar off camera.

While serial gourmand and food critic Matthew Preston sits in on the show raising his eyebrows and picking at food like a sparrow, the buttons on his sports coat look like they’re ready to explode across the room. It’s obvious he’s tucking in after the show.

Guest celebrity chefs are no different. While they lavish attention on the finer arts of food preparation and turn their noses up at pre-prepared mayonnaise, half of them look like they’ve been super-sizing themselves at McDonalds.

In this country you’d never trust a man who didn’t drink. It’s equally hard to trust a fat chef.

On the track
A good workout on the stepper. 40 minutes all over 140 bpm. 563 Calories and 746 steps.

In the mean time stay tuned, highly tuned and remember, most people who are overweight don't eat enough - of the right food at the right time.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

LIBBY TRICKETT SCOFFS FRIED CHICKEN - Saturday 22nd May 2010

2010-05-31T06:44:00.000-07:00

HOT NEWS FROM FROM THE ALLITERATIVE KENTUCKY FRIED CHICKEN WEBSITE
'Fast food franchise KFC is injecting $35 million to launch its latest menu addition, Cayan Grill chicken, with a campaign headed up by Olympic swimmer Libby Trickett.'

'Trickett has taken on the role of brand ambassador for the new line, appearing in a series of 30 second tv ads which launch today, and due to make appearances at some promotional events.'

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvBhj4GAipY

Photo may be subject to copyright

This would have to take the biscuit; fresh faced, slim and athletic, we're now seeing Mrs Trickett on TV selling her soul and her body to the junk food industry. I expect her to balloon out over the course of the campaign and take on the shape of a true-blue Kentucky Fried Chicken and Pepsi Max customer.

On the face of it, the Cayan Grill Chicken looks like good wholesome food. ButI suspect Kentucky Fried Chicken isn't greatly interested in Cayan Grill Chicken. It's the upselling and the supersizing that makes the money, the chips and the Pepsi.

I thought sport was meant to be character building. Maybe I was wrong.

On the track
A modest workout on the stepper. 30 minutes for 3873 calories and 507 steps.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and order chips with your next bucket of fat.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

HEART FOUNDATION BIOMETRIC SURVEY - Friday 21st May 2010

2010-05-27T00:07:00.000-07:00

Read that the Heart Foundation is working with the Australian Bureau of Statistics to conduct a comprehensive national health survey that includes biomedical data such as actual height, weight, blood pressure, blood cholesterol and glucose levels.

Another vapid of vapids. Same old same old. Ho hum, ho hum.

This is the sort of data every doctor should be supplying to a national repository as a matter of course.

I wrote to the PR woman at the Heart Foundation for a list of the tests. She gave me the brush off and told me to contact the Bureau of Statistics.

However, I'll bet you my last razoo they won't be measuring how aerobically fit people are, despite a low level of aerobic fitness being the principal driver of metabolic dysfunction.

They won't measure strength and flexibility either.

These people don't want to get their hands dirty.

They won't measure levels of homocysteine or C-reactive protein, markers of metabolic dysfunction more appropriately targeted than cholesterol.

Whilst I notice they're measuring weight, I'll also bet they don't measure percent body fat. They'll go for body mass index.

This is just more academic busy work designed to give someone a PhD.

On the track
A good session out early with the boys.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and wait for someone from the Bureau of Statistics to come round to your house and run the ruler over you.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

HEART FOUNDATION TICK PROGRAM - Thursday 20th May 2010

2010-05-26T23:07:00.000-07:00

Found a brochure I picked up from McDonalds a while ago announcing that the National Heart Foundation had sold its tick (and its soul) to McDonalds.

Like an earlier blog I wrote about academics getting into bed with drug companies, this too fits into the lying-down-with-dogs category.

One half of me says that if you eat mince meat, lettuce and tomato at home it's OK; the other half says that if you buy it from a junk foodery it's not.

The Heart Foundation has taken a very soft line with McDonalds.

It cannot be forgiven for turning a blind eye to the massive damage that fast food industries do to the arteries that the Foundation goes to such length to protect. A couple of innocuous products doesn't stand as penance for the rest of the stuff this conglomerate and its independent distributors sells.

But why would anyone be recommending bread rolls stuffed with meat or chicken and a bit of salad? This country is awash with people who eat too much bread. It fattens them up. White bread at that. The Heart Foundation must be attracted to the dough.

Chicken nuggets, they've given them the tick too. Goodness knows what's in them, compressed bits of mashed chicken smeared with fat and bread crumbs. I don't think that's the sort of diet the Heart Foundation should be recommending. I betcha they don't serve them at board meetings.

The wraps look OK, but the problem is that as soon as anyone goes into a McDonaldry as likely as not, as well as something nutritious they'll also come out with a bucket of fat in the form of chips and a fatshake.

You'd think that giving the tick to a company that probably does more than just about any other company on earth to fatten up people up would leave a nasty taste in the mouth of all those surgeons.

Anyway, what can you expect of a medical charity that also gives its tick of approval to

- bread

- bircuits

- breakfast biscuits

- fruit bars

- pasta

- chips

- cheese

- ice cream

- oils

- pies and pasties?

And in case you missed it on their website, here it is again.

On the track
No track today. It's getting colder and I appear to be getting lazier.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and eat your mince meat and salad at home.

John Miller

http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

BACK AND HIP PAIN - Wednesday May 19th 2010

2010-05-24T06:18:00.000-07:00

There's an epidemic of musculo-skeletal dysfunction in our community. Ask any group of people 'Who here has either got a crook back, stiff neck, 'cold' shoulder, bung hip, game leg, dicky knee or sore wrist?’ and at least 50% of people will put their hand up.

The good news is that in 80% of cases it's not a medical problem, it's a fitness problem. Chances are you're not strong enough or flexible enough to keep your body in good alignment.

The solution? You need a good strength and flexibility training program to straighten yourself up.

There are two key principles involved here.

1. Tight muscles pull bones out of alignment. That’s the bad news. The good news is that by loosening tight muscles the bones will go back into alignment.

If you do the right exercises, long enough and often enough, there’s a better than even chance you’ll straighten yourself up. Poor function will be restored to good. You’ll start to feel better. Your pain will go away. All you have to do is find the right exercises.

2. The cause of the pain is rarely at the site of the pain – so a rub down and a hot wheat bag on the spot where it hurts may give you some temporary relief but won’t treat the cause of the problem. Over the years it will just get worse.

With lower back pain there’s a chain of dysfunction. Tight calf, hamstring and buttock muscles take your pelvis out of alignment. When that happens, the bones above it are taken out of alignment as well.

It puts pressure on the muscles, tendons, ligaments and discs in your lower back. They ‘feel the pinch.’ You tell people you’ve got a crook back.

Next week I’ll give you an exercise to loosen up your calf and hamstring muscles and get you sitting up straighter. Do that and you square your pelvis up and take the pressure off the bones of your lower back.

Then there’s that better than even chance that millimeter by millimeter, your lower back pain will start to go away.

On the track
Back walking with the boys.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if it’s weak strengthen it; if it’s tight loosen it.

John Miller

www.globalbackcare.com

FEELING BETTER - Tuesday 15th May 2010

2010-05-24T06:12:00.000-07:00

I'm feeling better.

I'm up and about, dehydrated, thinner but definitely better. By tomorrow I should be as right as rain.

The body does indeed have remarkable recuperative powers.

On the track
No track.

In the meantime get ready to get back on the track.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com

GO BACK TO BED - Monday 17th May 2010

2010-05-24T06:06:00.000-07:00

I'm still crook.

I got up just before 6.45am and went out the front to tell my mates I wouldn't be going with them today.

Then I went back to bed.

Christine said I should go to the doctor, but I don't feel like paying $80 to be told I'm crook. Maybe I should have gone to the chemist. I've seen adverts in toilets at airports for stuff that's mean to fix you up when you're crook.

So I just stayed in bed - and the loo. I can feel myself gradually getting better.

On the track.
Only track today was between the bed and the loo. I don't know where all this water is coming from. I've lost 3Kg.

In the meantime lie low and let nature run its course. The body has remarkable recuperative powers; stimulate them - sometimes with exercise, sometimes with rest.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com

STILL CROOK - Sunday 16th May

2010-05-24T06:03:00.000-07:00

I'm still crook. Up and down half the night. Don't feel like eating. I'm like an animal. When they get sick they go away and hide for a couple of days.

I'm hiding in bed and in the loo. My feet are cold, my bones ache.

On the track
No track today, no way.

In the meantime lie down and go to sleep.

John Miller
www.fitandheathyonline.com

I'VE TAKEN A BAIT - Saturday 15th May 2010

2010-05-24T05:45:00.001-07:00

I must have taken a bait somewhere in Brisbane. It could have been at Brisbane Airport.

There doesn't have to be much wrong with you to put you right off your game.

Christine and I went to the Australian Institute of Sport for a swim and a hot spa. And then it hit me.

It's a very interesting phenomenon. Water has been pouring out of me. Maybe this could be some sort of blood pressure-lowering therapy!

I felt crook and cold and went to bed in the afternoon. My feet were like ice. The Achilles and calves hurt like hell.

I went to be early and slept like a log, except for the half a dozen times I had to get up.

Sheesh, it's no fun being crook.

On the track
Went swimming for half and hour.

In the meantime it's hard to stay tuned, when you're crook.

John Miller

LOOK AFTER YOURSELF AT WORK - Friday 14th Maty 2010

2010-05-24T05:40:00.000-07:00

If you think you can spend 8 hours a day sitting down without moving you've got another think coming. Sooner or later something's going to give, usually your mind, or your back, neck and shoulders.

You've just got to give yourself a break, in fact a number of breaks for 10 minutes to freshen up. Call it a quick defrag.

Here's a few activities to pick from.

STRETCH
Spend ten minutes doing a few stretches, for your neck, shoulders and back.

RELAX
It's as simple as putting on the headphones and playing a relaxation MP3. It's an essential feature of a work fit program designed to calm you down.

WALK AROUND THE BLOCK
Limber up! One of the best things you can do for your body is go for a quick walk around the block once a day. Endorphins will be released, more oxygen will be pumped up into your head, you’ll blow off a bit of ’steam’; you'll feel better.

YOGA AND TAI CHI
Any organisation that's up to speed these days will have either a yoga program or a tai chi program. Manage your time so you can go a couple of times a week.

Or, search on the internet for a copy of Yolanda Pettinato's Simply Yoga program. A few poses each day will loosen up your mind and the rest of your body. The Yoga CD may be available from your local bookstore. That's where I picked up my copy.

Or get a copy of Keith Jeffrey's Easy Tai Chi program. Once you learn it, it only takes 4 minutes. It's available online.

JUGGLE
Get yourself a set of juggling balls.

One of the absolute best ways to take your mind off your work is to do some juggling. You can't think about work and juggle at the same time.

Want to see how it's done. Go to YouTube and search for Chris Bliss amazing juggling finale.

So there you have it.

Look after yourself in the workplace. You'll feel better. Your back, neck and shoulders will feel better. You’ll be more productive. You’ll last the distance. You’ll save money and time loitering around surgeries and pharmacies.

On the track
No track again. Flew down to Sydney, met up with a cousin I hadn't seen for 40 years and drove back from Sydney to Canberra.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and look after yourself at work.

John Miller
http://www.millerhealth.com.au/

HEADACHES - Thursday 13th May 2010

2010-05-24T05:00:00.000-07:00

I've been delivering seminars all day again. It's amazing how many people get headaches, don't sleep well and lack energy.

Some put up with it. They think it is a normal part of the human condition. Everyone gets headaches don't they?

Some spend a fortune on pills. Others spend hours traipsing through surgeries looking for the magic bullet.

No-one ever told them to get themselves into a good exercise program.

You'd have to wonder what years of PhysEd in schools did to them. Those PhysEd teachers must have switched them right off.

On the track
No track today. Another day of seminars and then off to spend the evening with my editor.

in the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned, go outside and get some fresh air.

john Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

DOCTORS ON THE BREAD LINE - Wednesday 11th May

2010-05-24T04:50:00.000-07:00

One of the fall outs of Tuesday night's budget was a piece in the paper about a local Canberra doctor being appreciative of the Government providing her practice with a $25,000 grant to employ a nurse.

The doctor let us into the secret that her annual income is $140,000.

She also let us into another secret, she charges $78 for each 15 minute consultation.

Add that up.

Eight hours a day work at $312 an hour adds up to $2,500. Multiply that by 5 and you get $10,000 a week., Multiply that by 44 weeks a year and you get $440,000, a far cry from $140,000.

There's three doctors in the practice. By the tone of the article you'd think they were on the bones of their arse and needed the Government to pay for a nurse.

All the government needs to do is help nurses set themselves up in private practice and give them access to the prescription pad.

Who is it that dreams up these stunts? How does the Government fall for them?

On the track
No track. In Brisbane running 6 seminars for the day. That's quite enough.

In the meantime stay tuned highly tuned and if you feel crook get thee to a nursery.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

HOW TO BLOW $57 BILLION - Tuesday 11th May 2010

2010-05-24T04:25:00.000-07:00

Treasurer Wayne Swan bough down the Commonwealth Government's Budget this evening. $57 Billion has been allocated to the Department of Health. $57 Billion., it just rolls off the tongue as though it might have been $57 thousand, or $57 million. It's $57,000,000,000. When in the hell does it all go?

This is 16% of the Government's budget.

Some of the money will go to improve people's health, the great bulk of it will be poured down the medical black hole. People will not become fitter or healthier.

The Government says this is NEW. In reality it's Medicare 1975 version 35. Next year we'll go through the same old same old again, and spend $65B.

The great tragedy is that the health of Australians is declining in direct proportion to the increase in Government expenditure.

Until the Government stops protecting the bloated, inefficient and expensive general practice division of the medical industry to the degree it does, particularly at the local level, it's stuffed.

The big announcement of the evening is that the Government is going to give doctors in private practice $25,000 to employ more nurses. Would that they had decided to support more nurses setting up their own clinics as an alternative service to the one provided by doctors. As it stands the nurses will continue to act as doctors' lackeys and the doctors will pocket the change.

In this country doctors just love doing busy work, work that other professional groups like nurses, fitness practitioners, pharmacist, naturopaths and counsellors can do better.

People should only be going to doctors for things that require the kind of medical attention that only doctors can provide. Primary health care for the great bulk of metabolic, musculo-skeletal and psychological complaints doesn't need a doctor. on the contrary.

On the track
No track, presented 6, one hour seminars to staff at a corporate organisations. That's sufficient.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and remember, you can't solve a fitness problem with a medical solution.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com

HEALING BACK PAIN NATURALLY - Monday 10th May 2010

2010-05-24T03:57:00.000-07:00

MAGNOLIA HEALTH
I recently got a note from the Health Sciences Institute http://hsibaltimore.com/ about the effectiveness of green lipped mussels in the treatment of arthritis and joint pain. I've read about green lipped mussels in previous stuff they've circulated. This time the note came with a recommendation to buy the product from Magnolia Health in Brisbane, Australia.

It comes branded as Globalvit Joints.

Here's the blurb from the website.

Globalvit Joints capsules help support healthy joint function and assist relieve pain and swelling.

Globalvit Joints takes an holistic approach to joint health combining a number of active ingredients such as Glucosamine, Chondroitin, Green Lipped Mussel, Vitamin E and C, and the B group vitamins which may help you
- Reduce joint pain
- Increase your range of movement
- Reduce inflammation
- Support collagen and cartilage synthesis
- Management of Arthritis
- Support general joint health

I like this holistic approach with the preparation including a number of efficacious ingredients. The more the merrier I say. So I took the opportunity and went out to see the company near the Breakfast Creek Hotel and was cordially received by Managing Director Carly Tribe and her associate Michelle.

My brother Geoff and I have been interested in establishing an affiliate program with a company that targets specific metabolic, musculo-skeletal and psychological dysfunctions.

This is what Magnolia Health does - researching the recipe for a wide range of non-pharmaceutical sources, many previously reported in HSI publications, getting it made to their specifications and then distributing it world-wide.

I like the holistic nature of the products. Their joint, prostate, urinary tract and diabetes preparations are leading edge. I suggest you take a look at their website www.magnoiliahealth.com.au

Watch this space.

On the track

No track. Got up eatly to go into the city and came home late after a number of appointments.

In the meantime stay tuned highly tunes and if you're looking for an arthritis support preparation, go to www.magnoliahealth.com.au

John Millerwww.globalbackcare.com

A LOAD OF TRIPE - Sunday 9th May 2010

2010-05-22T06:23:00.000-07:00

Have you ever noticed that many diet advertisements make reference to the fact that all diets are fad diets, with the exception of the one being promoted?

The other thing to be wary of is not what the adverts say, but what they don’t say.

For instance there are adverts doing the rounds lauding the nutritional benefits of a breakfast biscuit that contains 22% protein. Most food made with flour only has about half that amount of protein, so give it a big tick. Of course, what the adverts fail to mention is that the same breakfast biscuit contains 32% sugar, and that’s before you put the sugar on the top! It’s not a cereal, just a small and oddly-shaped biscuit, and with that amount of sugar there’s a good case for putting it in the confectionery aisle, along with all the other breakfast biscuits that contain more than 30% sugar.

Now I could be wrong about this, but I’m pretty sure that the high sugar way of life is more likely to turn little boys into fatties than he-men.

Stop for a moment and have a think about it. Why are you eating biscuits and confectionery for breakfast? Choose a genuine cereal, like rolled oats. It’s half the price and better for you.

The CSIRO Diet is a very good diet, in fact many who adopted it experienced a miracle change in body fat content. The diet works because the scientists stripped the junk food out of it. The only criticism I heard was that some of the cuts of meat were a bit pricey, but that’s not hard to overcome. Purchase cheaper cuts.

For most people these cheaper cuts are off the radar. It’s like as though they’ve vanished.

A lot of people in this country grew up with basic fare, not on lamb mind you, but good, old fashioned, common or garden, down to earth mutton, interspersed with even cheaper cuts.

These days, if you go out for tea, unless you’re in a Greek or Turkish restaurant, it’s hard to find a menu with the word ‘chop’ on it.

And you’ll have to scour a lot of menus before you’ll come across brain patties, steak and kidney, lambs fry, or tongue, and I know that while a few readers will drool at the thought of a plate of tripe and onions, a much higher percentage will be gagging over these very words.

I read somewhere that wild animals tend to go for the offal first because that’s where the essential nutrition is. Over the last 40 years we’ve stopped doing that and I suspect our health is suffering.

Maybe we deprive ourselves of some of this essential nutrition by just eating muscle meat, some of it from animals that have been cooped up in cages for a couple of months. At least in Australia we let our sheep and beef roam free, unlike in America where their cattle are stuck in lots and fed mush laced with anti-biotics.

Of course, once you start talking about meat these days you get into the fat-around-the-meat debate. I think that’s largely been put to rest. Cut it off.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and eat to nourish the cells of your body, not just to fill up your stomach.

On the track
No track today. Drove up to Sydney and then on to Brisbane ready for work on Monday.

Big surprise, my daughter, Lisa and the little fella, Jackson were at the gate to meet me.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

BACK PAIN - Saturday 8th May 2010

2010-05-22T06:18:00.000-07:00

There's an epidemic of musculo-skeletal dysfunction in our community. Ask any group of people 'Who here has either got a who's got back pain and at least 30% of people will put their hand up.

The good news is that in 80% of cases it's not a medical problem, it's a fitness problem. Chances are you're not strong enough or flexible enough to keep your body in good alignment.

The solution? If you're going to fix back pain you need a good strength and flexibility training program to straighten yourself up.

There are two key principles involved here.

1. Tight muscles pull bones out of alignment. That’s the bad news. The good news is that by loosening tight muscles the bones will go back into alignment.

If you do the right exercises, long enough and often enough, there’s a better than even chance you’ll straighten yourself up. Poor function will be restored to good. You’ll start to feel better. Your pain will go away. All you have to do is find the right exercises.

2. The cause of the back pain is rarely at the site of the back pain – so a rub down and a hot wheat bag on the spot where it hurts may give you some temporary relief but won’t treat the cause of the problem. Over the years it will just get worse.

With lower back pain there’s a chain of dysfunction. Tight calf, hamstring and buttock muscles take your pelvis out of alignment. When that happens, the bones above it are taken out of alignment as well.

It puts pressure on the muscles, tendons, ligaments and discs in your lower back. They ‘feel the pinch.’ You tell people you’ve back pain.

Loosen off your calf and hamstring muscles and you start sitting up straighter. Do that and you square your pelvis up and take the pressure off the bones of your lower back.

Then there’s that better than even chance that millimeter by millimeter, your lower back pain will start to go away.

On the track
On the stepper, 30 minutes at level 8: 608 steps and 465 calories.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if it’s weak strengthen it; if it’s tight loosen it.

John Miller

www.globalbackcare.com

BARNEY GOOGLE - Friday 7th May 2010

2010-05-22T00:17:00.000-07:00

Barney Google, with the goo-goo-goo-ga-ly eyes.
Barney Google had a wife three times his size
She sued Barney for divorceNow he's living with his horse
Barney Google, with the goo-goo-goo-ga-ly eyes.

This was one of the few songs my Dad used to sing. And 50 years later, blow me down if 'Google' hasn't become a household name world-wide. A prophet is not without honour ...

Until now I've been using the Health Blogarithm to post my views on topical issues. I'll continue to do that, I can't help myself. But as well as that I'll also be using it to promote some of my ebooks, particularly the Fix Back Pain series. I can't sit here thumping our articles without getting paid.

In internet parlance the key to success is getting your site up on the first page of Google. To date my internet business partner, The Gaveen and I have managed to get a first page rank for a number of keywords for the www.globalbackcare.com website. In fact we're chuffed about that. For instance if you search for Fix Back Pain there we are, on the first page, and in illustrious company I might add.

If you'd like to know how to do that send me a note and I'll put you in touch with The Gaveen.

The big hairy audacious goal
Our next big goal is to get a first page rank for the search term 'b*ck p*in'. There are millions of people searching for these key words every month and millions of websites trying to sell them stuff. (I've cloaked the words so Google won't recognise them on this blog.)

So, over the weeks and months you'll see articles and blogs about this search term. If you've got a crook b*ck you'll find the posts interesting.

When we get onto the first page of Google I'll report back.

The columnist
No, not fifth columnist, just columnist. I write for a couple of local newspapers in Brisbane. I'll post these articles for you from time to time as well.

On the track
Early morning walk and run with the boys.

In the meantime stay tuned and watch that first page of Google.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.crookback.com

THE TEA YOU HAVE BEFORE TEA - Thursday 6th May 2010

2010-05-21T04:25:00.000-07:00

It’s like this. You leave work tired and hungry. You have to pick up a few things from the supermarket.

Have you noticed that you never go to the supermarket on a full stomach? And being a while since you had something to eat there’s always a bit of slack in your trousers.

Anyway, you push through the turnstile and blow me down, if there aren’t any baskets there. Every second time I go shopping I have to scrounge around the checkouts and bring a stack of baskets back to where they should be.

You do the right thing. You start in the fruit and vegetable section, move round to the fish, drop a bottle of peach tea into your basket, load up with a few groceries and then think ‘Hmmmm, I could do with something on the way home.’

You sneak back to the vegetables section and get a handful of cashews.
Now nuts are good for you. If you look at cashews, they possess herbal health benefits that include killing bacteria and germs, stopping diarrhea, drying secretions, increasing the libido, and reducing fever, blood sugar, blood pressure muscle spasms, migraine headaches, tension, soreness and fatigue. They help reduce gallstones, facilitate the utilization of iron and the elimination of free radicals.
The big problem is they pack a powerful energy punch. Cashews are around 2,400 kilojoules (kJ) per 100gms, which is about the size of the handful you scooped into the plastic bag. To put things in perspective, depending on your size and the amount of physical activity you get each day, you need between 7,000 or 8,000 a day.

Be that as it may, you’re as hungry as a horse and 100 grams doesn’t seem all that much as you navigate the lid on the box, and dip the shovel in. Two cashews fall on the floor. You look around. No-one’s watching. You stoop down, pick them up and stuff them into your mouth; can’t let good food go to waste.

You’ve cleaned the full 100gms up by the time you’re half way home and stick the empty bag under the seat to hide the evidence.

It’s your turn to cook tea. You’re still hungry. The smell of food in the supermarket and the thought of food at home has made you even hungrier. You could eat the crotch out of a low flying duck.

But first, before you get started, you need a few Ritz cracker biscuits just to tide you over. (They’re called Ritz because no-one ever had 1 Rit.) Now, whilst Ritz cracker biscuits have 2118 kJ /100gms, the redeeming feature is that each one is very small. But that only provides you with all the more reason to get through 20 of them while you’re cutting up the vegetables. There’s around 600kJ.

And they do taste better with some dip. Some of the dips contain 2000 kJ/100 grams. On this night you pull back and only have half the container, there’s 1000kJ, and all of which raises a thirst; and after all it’s been a long hard slog at the office. You’ve come home tired and depressed so the next thing you reach for is a central nervous system depressant. Duh!

The Heart Foundation reckons you’ll benefit by having a glass of wine a day; you interpret that as one’s good, two’s better and three’s best. Today it’s mid week so you decide to go easy, and restrict yourself to two glasses. A regular glass contains about 300kJ, your glasses contain 400 kJ. All up 800 kJ.

So if you want to know why your trousers are so tight they’re ring-barking you, let’s add up the kilojoules you’ve had before you’ve had your tea:

• cashews 2400
• cracker biscuits 600
• dip 1000
• wine 800

Total 4,800 kJ

On the track
Spent 30 minutes on the steppoer, 507 steps and 387 calories.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and eat and apple on your way home.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

Epilogue. I forgot to tell you about the Cherry Ripe that someone put into the basket at the supermarket. That was an extra 1500kJ after tea.

GARVAN INSTITUTE ON THE BLUDGE - Wednesday 5th May

2010-05-21T03:59:00.000-07:00

Went out to the letter box this morning and there's an unsolicited letter from the Garvan Medical Research Institute asking for a donation.

These people have a hide. Not satisfied with the funds they can prise out of the NH&MRC and wealthy dowagers from the leafy suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne, they've now tuned their guns on the hoi polloi.

But what could you expect for an organisation set up by the Catholic Church and the University of New South Wales? Blend in the NH&MRC, Big Pharma and Madison Avenue in the form of a fund raising and PR department and they end up putting the bite on people like me. They must have spent a fortune sending out hundreds of thousands of letters, all in the hope of suckering 3% of people into sending them a donation. These are the sort of people that used to tug the heartstrings of my Mum and Dad.

A few years ago it was a cardiac charity setting up booths in shopping centres staffed by kids in suits.

Why do they want money from me?

When it comes to the Garvan Institute, it's not as though all those boffins are sitting on high stools peering down microscopes with the seat out of their pants and ladders in their panty hose.
Last year the Institute had an income of $64m. The spent $44m (of which $28,000,000 went on salaries) and trousered the rest. That's a cool $2o which no doubt has been added to the $100m in assets.

They want more. They obviously can't get any more from serial soft touch, Lady Fairfax or colourful Sydney businessman Trevor Kennedy and his wife, so they've written to the likes of me out in suburbia. Well sorry boffins, my charity dollars for this year have been allocated. It's gone to Somalia, or the Sudan or somewhere. You've called too late.

Pity the NSW Government. Despite going broke, last year they gave the Garvan $3.7m - which, no doubt got squirreled away into the hollow log that contains the $20m.

The flyer in the envelope with the letter begging for money extolled the virtues of the Institute and what jolly good, hard working fellows they all are. No mention that it's just another sheltered workshop for the academically gifted.

They're just one of many sheltered workshops up there in Sydney, research organisations run by the Sydney University and the University of NSW, spawned to suck on the NH&MRC tit and Big Pharma from cradle to grave.

Their 400 staff are in a perpetual drool as they hitch their wagons onto the latest gravy train passing through town.

Guess what they're researching at the moment?

- Obesity Research
- Osteoporosis Research
- Weight and Blood Pressure Medication
- Diabetes Risk Study
- Glutamine in Type 2 diabetes
- Pre-diabetes: early mechanisms in the development of type 2 diabetes.

You can put down the glasses the results are in. Eat less fat, flour and sugar. Exercise like buggery and get your acid/alkaline ratio back into the normal range. All fixed. These people are either very young or have short memories.

According to the bumpf on their website -

The Garvan Institute is a global leader in diabetes research and committed to finding new ways to understand, control and prevent the disease. Garvan researchers are tackling the problem of type 2 diabetes from many directions, including: investigating the role of genes in the development of type 2 diabetes; collaborating with scientists at the Shanghai Institute of Materia Medica to unlock the potential of traditional Chinese medicines for better treatments; and understanding the molecular mechanisms underlying the disease.

These people don't have a clue about exercise not do they give a stuff about it. As the population becomes unfitter and fatter these people are peering down microscopes looking at the Islets of KD Langerhans. The reference to the Shanghai Institute means trips. They're trying to find out why Chinese medicine works. Hello! You don't have to find out why. It's been working vefry nicely thank you very much for a few thousand years. Modern medical research is about as arrogant as it gets.

World-wide collaborations have been set up. Maps have been Blue-tacked on walls and pins have been stuck into places all over the world. Pinz meenz tripz. They want me to pay for them. They're dreaming.

Simply put, this is a medical charity masquerading as a research centre that's turned academic bludging into an art form. Cop this -

You can create an online fund raising page for many different occasions that mark your life:

If you are having a birthday or wedding, why not ask people to make a donation to Garvan rather than give you unwanted presents?

If you have an anniversary or celebration, you can suggest that if people would like to honour this, they can do so through their donation to Garvan.

If a loved one has passed away, you can ask people to donate to Garvan in memory of your loved one instead of giving flowers.

If you are participating in an organised fundraising event such as a marathon, swim or triathlon, you can choose for proceeds to go to Garvan.

It's enough to make you want to ram your fingers down your throat and roll your eyes through to the back of your neck.

Like all these institutes it's run by boffins who spend a quarter of their life writing research grants and a quarter of their life sitting on review panels sniffing each others' bums and making sure they all get grants. The NH&MRC needs to bring Hercules in to muck out this stable.

Then they spend another quarter of their life doing some research, finishing off with the final quarter sprinting to the finish line writing papers referred by their mates for research journals no-one reads. Then it's off to international conferences to deliver the papers, sniff more bums, scratch more backs, quaff more Grange Hermitage supplied by drug companies and get their heads patted. It's a great big farce. Why? Because while all this is going on the population is getting fatter and unfitter by the day.

Papers that's what it's all about. You can look at some of them in the back of the Annual Report. These people don't produce anything except papers. They don't make anything, they don't sell anything. You'd think that after researching for the last 80 years the Garvan Institute would be rolling in income from patents.

And just who are these people? Most of them are second-raters who couldn't get a job out in the real world. Anyone who's smart as a tack gets out and makes their fortune producing something of value. Read the stories of Jobs, Ellison and Gates. These are stories of intelligence put to good use, that created value for themselves and their community.

The ones that stayed behind got a second class honors degree. If you've got one of them and you hang arouncampus long enough they'll take pity on you and slip you a few labouring jobs, running tutes for wet-behind-the-ears undergraduates and cleaning test tubes. If you can stick that out for a couple of years you're qualified start a doctorate. Once you've done that you can become a post.doc fellow and then you're on the academic equivalent of the dole for life.

After that it's busy work. It used to be vanity, now it's busy work.

Busy work, busy work, all is busy work - and cribbing a bit of work time to write letters to the papers telling the Government to spend more money on research so you can keep putting bread on the table. You sign your name 'Bill Nerd, PhD' just to let people know you're superior. To hell if what you're doing is useless.

Not only is it farce it's also tragedy that so much money can be spent on so many people with their heads down doing busy work. This is the academic equivalent of stimulating the economy by digging holes and filling them up again.

The great advances in health won't come out of a bloated, useless, self-serving Garvan Institute they'll come from people eating wisely and spending 40 minutes a day jogging round the block. Peering down microscopes and writing equations on white boards is the easy stuff. The hard stuff is getting people off their bums and out of the junk food eateries.

On the track
Out early with the boys, walking and running.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if you've got type 2 diabetes go for a 40 minute run every day and eat more methylhydoxychalcone polymer. You'll find it in your kitchen cupboard. It's called cinnamon.

John Miller
http://www.globalbackcare.com/
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/

SECONDARY HEALTH CARE - Tuesday 4th of May 2010

2010-05-19T05:51:00.000-07:00

Secondary health care is the health care you can get for free by talking to other people, reading, searching the internet ...

It doesn't cost much.

Don't know what to do to get yourself back into good nick? Ask someone who's in good nick or look it up on the internet. Just keep in mind you're probably best to avoid the sites that suggest you take a tablet, creme or suppository to mask the symptoms, rather than actually doing something to fix the cause of the dysfunction.

And steer clear of the Cochrane Collaboration. It's a completely vapid and useless site if you're looking for straight forward information. If you've got a crook back go there and see if you can get a good set of exercises to fix yourself up. Not there! A waste of time, just an academic wank.

Go to your doctor’s own website and see what information is there to help you over a rough spot. (I bet your doctor doesn't have such a website, that's why the surgery is always full.)

A lot of the advice on the internet is basic health stuff put there by people who collectively have had thousands of dealings with the same problem as you have now. If you go to www.wddty.com you can ask questions and you'll get responses from all manner of people who've dealt with the same problem(s) you have.

Another good site I use is www.hsibaltimore.com

In this day and age we tend to downgrade the learning that comes from observation as opposed to scientific research. Keeping your eyes and ears open doesn't seem to be a highly valued scientific skill these days.

Keep in mind that most of the people making observations based on experience and dealing with real people are too busy to go to the trouble of writing an article for a journal.

The other thing you have to keep in mind is most of the the scientific researchers are working out of the pockets of drug companies. If their research isn't tainted it will be diverted away from working out what needs to be done to stimulate the body's own recuperative powers.

In this day and age the people who are fair dinkum about helping you either write a book or set up a website. They don't swan around the world scratching each others' backs and grovelling in front of drug company stands at international conferences.

No-one ever said that a treatment has to have been written up in refereed journal for it to be work. In fact most of it never is. Some of the ancient remedies and remedies your grandmother and her doctor used will do as much good for you as the latest pill. Pity that people are either too young to know about them or have short memories.

The advice you’re likely to get from any source will vary in quality, but if you’re an internet surfer you’ll have already developed skills of discernment. Keep in mind that high tech advice and advice from the blue chip medical fraternities is often no better than low tech advice, so don’t over look the advice that a good fitness leader, naturopath, yoga teacher and life coach can give you to sort out your problems.

When searching on the internet you'll soon get a feel for sites that look genuine. It's likely that you'll soon start steering clear of squeeze pages with lots of bumpf and hype, though you never can tell.

On the track
On the stepper, 30 minutes, nice and easy.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and ask around for advice on what you can do to fix your health problems.

John Miller
www.fitandheakthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

THE NEW PRIMARY HEALTH CARE - Monday 3rd May 2010

2010-05-19T05:31:00.000-07:00

The new primary health care is the health care you give to yourself, which speeds up the rehab process and stimulates the recuperative power within your own body.

You don't need to go to a doctor for this type of primary health care. You already know what to do:

- exercise regularly with vigor
- eat wisely
- get enough sleep
- meditate
- distract yourself from being busy and miserable
- take decent holidays.

and all the rest of that stuff that you know you need to do.

Maybe you've forgotten what to do? As a species we seem to be mighty forgetful.

When we're crook out initial reaction is to reach for the bottle for our medication of choice. We forget that there are other things we could do which are more effective.

I'll give you and example. A lot of people I see get headaches. They're not caused by a lack of Panadeine.

So why do we persist in taking the palliative route instead of thinking, 'What's caused this headache and what do I need to do to firstly get rid of it, and secondly not have it happen again?'

I'll leave it to you to work that one out. I hope you can remember.

On the track
Running with the boys.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and remember what you need to do to keep yourself in good shape.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

THE PARABLE OF THE BUTTERFLY - Sunday 2nd May 2010

2010-05-19T04:59:00.000-07:00

A man found a butterfly cocoon.

One day a small opening appeared and the man watched the butterfly as it struggled to force its body through the small hole. It appeared that it had gotten as far as it could and could go no farther.

The man decided to help the butterfly, so he got a pair of scissors and snipped off the remanding bit of the cocoon.The butterfly then emerged easily, but with a swollen body and tiny, shriveled wings.

The man continued to watch the butterfly, expecting that at any moment the wings would enlarge and expand to be able to support the body, which would contract in time.

Neither happened. In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shivered wings, never able to fly.

What the man had not understood was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to get through the tiny opening were nature's way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings so that it would be ready for flight once it achieved freedom from the cocoon.

Some struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If nature allowed us to go through life without any obstacles, it would cripple us. We would not be as strong as we might otherwise be.

And we could never fly...

-Author unknown

On the track
On the stepper, 40 minutes all over level 8. Now that's a good workout, expending 643 calories.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and spread your wings and fly.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

WORKCOVER SA PRODUCES A VAPID REPORT ON BACK PAIN - Saturday 1st May 2010

2010-05-19T04:44:00.000-07:00

Workcover in South Australia have produced a vapid report on back injuries. They got a team from Adelaide Health Technology Assessment (AHTA) a money-making venture of the Discipline of Public Health, School of Population Health and Clinical Practice at the University of Adelaide to prepare the documentation.

It's the usual useless literature review stuff, the same old rehash of the same old stuff the NH&MRC produces.

Cop this:

Draft recommendation 4. 1. 1
In the majority of cases of acute low back pain (approximately 95%), no specific diagnosis can be made nor needs to be made.

This is just bunkum.

6.7 Specific exercise programs

Draft recommendation 6. 7. 1

There is insufficient evidence to recommend specific exercise programs (e.g. stretching, strengthening, side bends, flexibility/mobilising exercise, or aerobics) over no treatment for workers with acute low back pain. The McKenzie exercise, however, may have some benefits over no treatment for workers with subacute low back pain (Grade C).

More bunkum. When you see the McKenzie exercise prescription you know the report has been written by physiotherapists.

Draft recommendation 6. 7. 2
There is insufficient evidence to recommend that specific exercise programs (e.g. graded activity, strengthening, stretching, aerobics, extension and flexion exercise) are superior to other conservative treatments or usual care (Grade A).

More bunkum. Surely this is evidence of a parallel universe. This is selective evidence at it's best, or is that worse? These people would have got more and better information about the treatment of back pain from a form guide.

Draft recommendation 7. 3. 2
There is some evidence that advice to maintain usual activities, provision of an education booklet and community-based group exercise* appears to be cost-effective first line interventions for acute low back pain.

Usual activities: I bet they don't include strength and flexibility exercises. And the booklet. I don't think many people became stronger or looser reading pamphlet.

If this is the best Workcover can do, no wonder the South Australian Government is going broke.

On the track

Took it easy.

In the meantime stay tuned highly tuned and steer clear of reports on back care produced by academics.

John Miller

www.globalbackcare.com
www.fitandhealthyonline.com

DON'T SMOKE, YOU'LL BE RIPPED OFF Friday 30th May 2010

2010-05-19T04:30:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I wrote about the Government's proposed ripping $5b out of smokers' pockets supposedly to stop them from smoking.

On one count it's a good thing to put up the price of cigarettes. A few less people will smoke and a few more people may smoke less. Give it a tick.

However, this price rise is a blatant tax grab, ripping money off the working class to put into the pockets of doctors. When the workers wake up to the fact that Kevin Rudd and Nicola Roxon have pulled a swiftie on them they'll be pulling on their red shirts and storming the barricades around Parliament House.

If ever there was a good reason to stop smoking it would be to prevent the feeding of the insatiable appetite of a greedy, inefficient and bloated medical industry for public money.

This is yet another bad policy solution to a bad policy problem. The more money poured down the medical black hole the worse the health of the population.

On the track
Running with the boys. A good steady pace.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if ever you needed a good reason to stop smoking this is it.

John Miller
www.globalbackcare.com
www.fitandheathyonline.com

WHATEVER YOU DO, DON'T SMOKE - Thursday 29th April 2010

2010-04-29T18:30:00.001-07:00

The Government came out today with some very courageous news.

Packets of cigarettes will have to be in plain wrappings and the price of cigarettes will go up by $2.70 for a pack of 20.

I used to smoke at school; boosted my ego, a 2 or 3 a day man. Later, around exam time I'd have a few if I was studying late into the night.

One morning my 4 year old daughter, Jo was in the kitchen with me and she said, 'Dad, you know those things that are no good for your lungs, there's some up in the cupboard.' I said, 'Really', took them down and went out to the burning tin burnt them. (This was in the days when we didn't have global warming and you could have a 44 gallon drum in your back yard to burn stuff in.)

Jo turned 39 earlier this month. I haven't had a smoke since.

Anyway, back to the Government's decision.

It certainly is courageous. A lot of people are going to be very upset.

I know from my surveys that people who can't afford to smoke will take an even greater share of the houskeeping to fund their addiction. These are people who probably form a good proportion of the Labor constituency.

Whoever dreamed up this increase in taxation should first have thought about developing a strategy to assist people to kick the habit. Give comes before take. Free seminars, free counselling, free what-ever-it-takes to assist people to stop smoking. This is just another example of politics on the run by people who live in ivory towers.

Instead what have we got, just another tax on the poor and the stupid.

Maybe some people will immediately give up. I heard one fellow say that until a pack got to $20 he'd keep going.

One health adviser said that if every one cut back 2 or 3 smokes a day they're be square financially. Maybe this is what will happen.

Whatever, it's a tough assignment and it needs a thoughful, helpful, consistent, long term strategy. I see no evidence of that.

My feeling is that for Governments, smoking cessation has to be a gradual process, focussing on assisting people to give up. Instead, where is it going to park the money - into the hospitals account. How bad is that? At least half that money should be going to assist people to give it up.

Putting up the price is the stick, it's a useful strategy, but not without the carrot. It just puts people's back up.

Stratgy for the medium term - say five years

1. Restrict the sale of cigarettes to liquor outlets. This strategy would involve compensating shops that currently sell cigarettes. It would be a medium term strategy to replace their income for a period of time.

2. Funnel the current increase in tax into

- smoking cessation programs

- subsidies for shop keepers to get out of the business of selling cigarettes.

3. Restrict the number of packets people can buy at a time. This buying a carton has to stop.

4. Reduce packet sizes to 10 cigarettes. Whoever put a stop to selling packets of ten needs their head read. The bigger the packet the more people smoke. For many people restricting themselves to 10 cigarettes a day would be a good first step in the process of giving them up.

5. A more radical approach would be to ban tailor-made cigarettes. People are quite welcome to smoke but they'd have to roll their own. That would stop more than a few people from smoking. It would turn a lot of glamour pusses off smoking.

6. People who smoke should pay a higher Medicare levee.

7. From a certain date, people under 21 and over the age of 18 have to register as a new smoker and show their registration every time they purchase cigarettes. It's serious stuff. You have to have a license to drive a car, why not a license to smoke. Getting the license would invove attending a day seminar on why smoking is not a good idea.

8. In five years time every smoker needs a registration card - only obtained after a one day seminar. No card, no serve.

Prepare ye the way. The powers that be need to tell people that these things are going to happen gradually, in 5 or 10 years and during that time provide support, massive support, bags of carrots.

On the track

A long, slow run for 31 minutes. Legs tight, but happy.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and whatever you do, don't smoke.

John Miller

http://www.millerhealth.com.au/
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/
http://www.crookback.com.au/

DEAR MINISTER - Wednesday April 28th 2010

2010-04-29T18:02:00.000-07:00

Ms Roxon
Minister for Health
Parliament House
Canberra ACT 2611

Dear Minister,

I notice that the AMA has put in a claim for $830m to fix up doctors' surgeries.

This sounds like a very worthwhile way to expend public money and stimulate the economy. In fact, being a refurbishment program it's something you may like to call on your colleague the Deputy Prime Minister to supervise. She has form on this sort of program.

Many of these doctors spend long, arduous hours in dark rooms with customers hacking all over them, all for scant personal financial gain. Many are sitting there, boiling in summer and freezing in winter with the seat out of their pants. I know that some of them need the addition of car ports to their rooms in order to prevent birds crapping all over their BMW’s and Mercs.

I'm all for the Government stepping in to improve conditions in surgeries. Some of the surgeries I’ve been in certainly do need a lick of pain and a dozen more comfortable chairs.

I haven't spoke to the President of the AMA about this, but I’d suggest the Government put in an extra $570m to pay for computers and a broadband connection so doctors can receive and send emails to their customers.

I also think that the Government should be paying subscriptions to Time, Readers Digest, Wheels and Women’s Weekly to ensure customers are kept up to date in their reading.

Minister, I’m in the health game, running corporate health seminars, conducting the CrookBack Clinic for individuals and writing volumes on health, fitness and wellbeing.

I’m looking around my home office. It does indeed need a tidy up, which I’m happy to do myself. It also needs painting and the carpet is worn, particularly in the doorway and under my feet. I’d like some more shelving. The book case and the cupboard are chockablock. In fact I have to admit I'd be ashamed to have someone come into this office at the moment.

I estimate that it will cost about $4,300 to paint the room and$2,700 for the carpet. The quote I got for new shelving was $3,500. I’ve also had a quote for an air-conditioner - $3,200, installed. The quotes I got for the painting, bookshelves and installation of the air-conditioner are GST free; I’ll be paying cash.

You can send the cheque to Miller Health Pty Ltd, P.O. Box 3718 Weston ACT 2611.

In the meantime Minister, stay tuned, highly tuned and remember, the best way to stimulate the economy is to pour more money down the medical black hole.

John Miller

On the track
It's Wednesday, out with the boys for a walk, shuffle and jog.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

AMA PUTS OUT THE BOWL - Tuesday 27th April 2020

2010-04-29T17:43:00.000-07:00

I couldn't believe it. There's the President of the AMA on the news tonight informing us that the AMA has put in a claim on the forthcoming Commonwealth Government budget for $830m to renovate doctors' surgeries.

First, where do they pluck these figures from? This mob always talks in millions, sometimes hundreds, sometimes thousands.

Second, this is an industry where a doctor on his own can pull in $300 - $400 Grand a year - and they want charity to paint their offices and get a few more comfortable chairs for their customers to sit in while they read 1991 Wheels, New Idea and Readers Digest magazines.

In most surgeries these days there's a number of doctors. These are million dollar businesses who want mug taxpayers to fund renovations. These are the same people who won't pay for their own professional development.

They're dreaming.

On the other hand my office needs painting, the carpet is starting to wear out and I could do with an air-conditioner in summer. I said to Christine that I think I'll write to the Minister for Health asking for a subsidy to tidy it all up.

On the track
No track today. Spent the day out at the AIS with a corporate group and arrived home, tired and happy.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if you're in the health game and want to dress up your office, send in a quote for renovations to the Minister for Health. She appears to be in a very generous mood at the moment.

John Miller
www.millerhealth.com.au
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com
www.crookback.com.au

DOCTOR'S ADVICE Monday 26TH April 2010

2010-04-29T17:29:00.000-07:00

There are 4 types of customers going to doctors’ surgeries.

1. The fit and healthy, those who take the doctor’s advice, do the things they need to do to stimulate their own body’s recuperative power and get better. The doctor rarely sees them.

2. The sick, those who regardless of what they do for themselves and what their doctor does for them don’t get better. There’s probably not of lot of these people, but things strike out of the blue, the cards fall the wrong way …

3. The lazy, those who don’t take their doctor’s advice to move heaven and earth to get themselves back in better shape. If you wander around shopping centres you’ll see them in the droves. People just not in great shape, and yet they still keep going to their doctor. It amuses me that doctors continue to keep them on the books.

This is the group on whom good doctors could have the most influence, particularly by withdrawing their services. The logic goes like this, ‘If you choose to ignore my advice to do the things that will restore poor health to good health, you can take your business elsewhere.

4. The gullible, those who get the wrong advice from their doctor – just take the pill to mask the symptoms and plough on. Their condition gradually gets worse.

Surgeries are full to overflowing of the 3rd and 4th groups of people.

Weeding out poor doctoring appears to be a tough assignment. On a grand scale a few get caught, as in the Dr Death and the Dr Vagina fiasco’s; but not many. There are few doctors or customers who are inclined to dob in bad doctors. It’s too much bother.

Last time I did it the Medical Board gave me the brush off. They stuck up for the doctor.

10 or so years of pre-service education and hours and hours of in-service education (paid for by the government and the drug companies) each year don’t seem to be contributing to the growth of fitter and healthier people. On the contrary. It’s the wrong model. Drug companies appear to have a grip on the medical profession that beggers belief.

That’s how it works in all other businesses. Why waste time tying to patch up people who won’t take responsibility for their own health?

The other co-conspirator in the poor health epidemic is the welfare system that keeps paying for people to attend surgeries and pharmacies.

And a welfare system it is, just another version of sit down money. If we’ve got work for the dole welfare we should have exercise for health welfare. No exercise, no welfare to supply you with cheap medication and visits to the surgery.

Don’t for a moment believe that Medicare has much to do with health, most of the payments are welfare payments, many to people who can afford to pay for the maintenance of their own body. And keep in mind, most of this maintenance doesn’t cost anything, just a bit of time.

It was a system designed to cover the medical expenses of those who couldn’t afford to pay for them themselves, those who’d been struck by an illness than came from out of the blue. It was not a system designed to provide everyone with cheap medical care for tens of years.

On the track
Out early with the boy, walked, shuffled and jogged.

In the meantime stay tuned and do whet ever it takes to keep yourself out of the surgery.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.con

THE MAN FROM SNOWY RIVER - Sunday 25th April 2010

2010-04-29T17:15:00.000-07:00

There was movement at the station, for the word had passed around
That the colt from Old Regret had got away,
And had joined the wild bush horses, he was worth a thousand pound,
So all the cracks had gathered to the fray.
All the tried and noted riders from the stations near and far
Had mustered at the homestead overnight,
For the bushmen love hard riding where the wild bush horses are,
And the stock-horse snuffs the battle with delight.

There was Harrison, who made his pile when Pardon won the cup,
The old man with his hair as white as snow;
But few could ride beside him when his blood was fairly up,
He would go wherever horse and man could go.
And Clancy of the Overflow came down to lend a hand,
No better horseman ever held the reins;
For never horse could throw him while the saddle-girths would stand,
He learnt to ride while droving on the plains.

And one was there, a stripling on a small and weedy beast,
He was something like a racehorse undersized,
With a touch of Timor pony, three parts thoroughbred at least,
And such as are by mountain horsemen prized.
He was hard and tough and wiry, just the sort that won't say die,
There was courage in his quick impatient tread;
And he bore the badge of gameness in his bright and fiery eye
And the proud and lofty carriage of his head.

Christine and I spent the night in Jindabyne and today went down to Dalgety to see the Snowy River. We'd never been there before. I was looking forward to it, but once there discovered that it's not the place you'd spend your holidays in. A pub and a few houses, that's about all.

And the river, this once proud and mighty river, choked off by the Snowy Mountains Hydro-electric Scheme is a shadow if its former self. They let a bit of water out of Lake Jundabyne to keep the locals happy but it doesn't go much further than the weir are Dalgety.

But I love the poem.

I'm never sure whether it's the horse or the rider.

'He was hard and tough and wiry ...'

When Andrew Patterson wrote it most Australians were hard and tough and wiry. Now half the population is fat weak and depressed. That it should come to this. King, Cawdor, Glamis all ...

A national tragedy played out over 120 years.

On the track
Came home Sunday night and went on the stepper. A good steady 40 minute workout, 508 steps for 388 calories - not enough to burn off the duck liver pate and the rest of the meal I had in Jindabyne on Saturday night.

In the meantime stay tuned, hard, tough and wiry.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonbline.cvom/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

PINK CUP CAKES - Saturday 24th April 2010

2010-04-28T15:29:00.000-07:00

I noticed today that one of the breast cancer research charities is holding a pink cup cake day to raise funds for breast cancer research.

These people don't get it.

It looks like a cool event, plenty of pink splashed around, but it sends the wrong message. One of the most significant pre-determinants of breast cancer is obesity. As a metabolic dysfunction it would also go with lack of aerobic fitness and not eating enough, of the right food at the right time.

Eating cup cakes with pink icing on the top is not the right food.

An apple-a-day day, or a run-around-the-park day would be more appropriate.

I'm not sure where this money goes to.

Most of the health research money in this country is funnelled into the sheltered workshops for the academically gifted.

Organisations like Sydney University have turned into an art form the establishment of all sorts of medical research institutes, many of them doing junk research -research that's been done before, research that's been done to death, selective literature reviews, research that compares the effectiveness of different drugs without comparing the drugs to lifestyle changes, research funded by drug companies ...

The other day someone made the breathtaking announcement that new research showed that if people exercise a bit more and lose 5 Kg, they'll better manage their Type 2 diabetes. Well, the researcher either was very young, had a very short memory or been living in a cave for the last 50 years.

To set the record straight, my heart goes out to people with breast cancer. My mother in law died well before her time because of it.

On the track
A good workout on the stepper. 40 minutes all over 140 bpm. 752 steps and 575 calories. I feel like the man who went down justified.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and for every cup cake you eat, spend 40 minutes on the track.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

PERFECT STORM - Friday 23rd April 2010

2010-04-28T15:12:00.001-07:00

Huge controversy this week is the Melbourne Storm Rugby League Football Club covertly paying its players more than they are allowed.

They've had two sets of books. It's like every second restaurant that has two tills. It's called cheating.

What the Storm RFC have done is commit the 11th commandment - 'Thou shalt not be caught.' On the field cheating is OK as long as you don't get caught. If you do get caught all it means is a free kick to the other side. Then it's forgotten.

The enormity of the over-payments scandal is over powering: $1.7m over 5 years and 25 players. Work it out, they paid their players a bit over $13,000 every year for 5 years. It's peanuts. What are these people going on about? It's only footb for chrissakes.

Give the other teams a free kick and get on with it.

(I suspect all the other clubs are getting free kicks as well; free cars, free houses, free trips, free lunches, free massages ...) They just know their commandments better!

So here we have 13 players in need of a rest being watched by 25,000 people in need of some exercise. It's a game.

Interesting:
- Storm memberships have sky-rocketed this week.

- The team handed out a thrashing to the Waratahs, 40:6

On the track
Out with the boys this morning. A steadily improving run. Achilles getting better.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and at what ever vocation you set your mind to, aim to earn as much money as you can - without cheating anyone.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

LOOK AFTER YOURSELF AT WORK - Thursday 22nd April 2010

2010-04-22T05:56:00.000-07:00

If you think you can spend 8 hours a day sitting down without moving you've got another think coming. Sooner or later something's going to give, usually your mind, or your back, neck and shoulders.

You've just got to give yourself a break, in fact a number of breaks for 10 minutes to freshen up. Call it a quick defrag.

Here's a few activities to pick from.

STRETCH
Spend ten minutes doing a few stretches, for your neck, shoulders and back. You can get the full list of stretching exercises from this link

http://www.globalbackcare.com/back-pain/index.html

RELAX
It's as simple as putting on the headphones and playing a relaxation MP3. It's an essential feature of a work fit program designed to calm you down. You can purchase my relaxation MP3 on this link:

http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/mp3_files/index.htm

WALK AROUND THE BLOCK
Limber up! One of the best things you can do for your body is go for a quick walk around the block once a day. Endorphins will be released, more oxygen will be pumped up into your head, you’ll blow off a bit of ’steam’; you'll feel better.

YOGA AND TAI CHI
Any organisation that's up to speed these days will have either a yoga program or a tai chi program. Manage your time so you can go a couple of times a week.

Or, search on the internet for a copy of Yolanda Pettinato's Simply Yoga program on this link:

http://www.naturaltherapypages.com.au/therapist/2477

A few poses each day will loosen up your mind and the rest of your body. The Yoga CD may be available from your local bookstore. That's where I picked up my copy.

Or get a copy of Keith Jeffrey's Easy Tai Chi program on this link:

http://www.easytaichi.com/

Once you learn it, it only takes 4 minutes.

JUGGLE
Get yourself a set of juggling balls.

One of the absolute best ways to take your mind off your work is to do some juggling. You can't think about work and juggle at the same time.

Want to see how it's done. Go to YouTube and watch Chris Bliss's amazing juggling finale.:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BBsYBJtj9-U

So there you have it.

Look after yourself in the workplace. You'll feel better. Your back, neck and shoulders will feel better. You’ll be more productive. You’ll last the distance. You’ll save money and time loitering around surgeries and pharmacies.

On the track
A big workout. Level 8 all the way for 40 minutes. 814 steps and 621 calories.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and look after yourself at work.

John Miller
http://www.millerhealth.com.au/
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

IT'S ALL OVER BAR THE GST - Wednesday 21st April 2010

2010-04-22T04:59:00.000-07:00

What a relief, nothing much to write about today. It's all, over bar the shouting.

And shouting there was.

The 'The Australian' quoted a Churchillian professor, Stephen Leeder as saying 'I think it's an OK beginning - as long as it's seen to be just a beginning.

John Deeble the feeble architect of the Medicare plan 35 years ago said, 'The Prime Minister is full of rhetoric and catchphrases.' This is from the man who thought it a smart idea to weld the medical and welfare systems together, the bloke who got us into the mess in the first place.

John Dwyer, self styled founding president of the Australian Healthcare Reform Alliance said, 'Operationally we don't see much of a difference.' By 'me' he meant 'I'.

Bob Wells of the ANU Primary Health Care Research Unit (another sheltered workshop f0r the academically gifted) said 'It's a disaster.'

AMA National President Andrew Pesce 'gave the plan guarded support.' He at least knows which side of his bread's buttered. They would have been quaffing Grange Hermitage down at the AMA club rooms until the wee hours last night.

Now wait for a lift in the GST from 10% to 15% to fund it. You little beaudy.

That's it
My big ambition for the next couple of months is to wrting more articles on health, fitness and wellbeing for people who want to keep themselves fit and healthy.

I'll be producing more ebooks on health and fitness topics.

As far as the governments of Australia are concerned, nobody gives a stuff about health and fitness. I'm sick of this medical stuff. It's just an expensive stunt designed to win more votes in marginal electorates. From now you'll be hearing more about health, fitness and wellbeing.

I'll be using the Health Blogarithm to inform people about my ebooks and products that I think could be useful for anyone interested in pursuing the fit and healthy way of life.

On the track
Went running this morning while the boys walked. It felt good to run not jog, but blow me down in the last step I took before I stopped I felt a twinge.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and steer clear of surgeries and hospitals.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/.

GRAB THE MONEY AND RUN - Tuesday 2pth April 2010

2010-04-21T22:44:00.001-07:00

The COAG meeting is over.

The Prime Minister struts the stage and says 'This is an historic moment. ... nurses and doctors will be happy.' (You betcha. Another $20B poured down their throats and p*ssed up against the wall.)

It's bunkum.

What we've got is more of the same. Another dash for cash before the dash for the planes. Death by PowerPoint and exhaustion has taken precedence over reason and logic. Premiers and Chief Ministers bribed into accepting a health policy that is out of date by a factor of 35 years.

Next year they'll be back in the same time, same room accepting the same bribes.

As the nation's health gets worse, all the prime Minister can do is write cheques to the medical industry.

If you thought this year's school building and housing insulation fiasco's were bad enough, they pale into insignificance when compared to the medical fiasco that goes on year after year. It has an unstoppable momentum, an unquenchable thirst for money

Today will go down in history as a most historical moment indeed - the moment when all Australian governments failed to grasp that

- the major health problem in this country is that too many people
are unhealthy. It's ambulances at the bottom of the cliff all over again

- governments don't need to own and run hospitals any more than they
need fto own and run power houses, airlines and banks

- if governments want to run hospitals they need to send out accounts

- if government s want to run hospitals they either have to employ
specialists on salariues or put out tenders

- private hospouate are quite capable of servicing people who can't
afford to pay their accounts - providng the welfare system is

- protection of the monopoly power of the medical industry is
doing this country irreparable harm

- you can't solve a fitness problem, with a medical solution

- the medical industry is unrelenting in it's drive to gouge
both its customers and Australian governments

- you can't cobble a health system to a welfare system

- you can't go to a hospital and expect to get instant attention;
they're not selling hamburgers

- you can't offer anyone a free service for anything without
going broke.

It sends the wrong message to the unfit and unhealthy. They don't need to smarten themselves up because the State will pay for any treatment they may need.

It sends the wrong message to the fit and healthy who see more and more of their money being spent on the unfit and unhealthy. Effort goes unrewarded. It's survival of the fattest.

It sends the wrong message to the state governments who instead of spending less on medical services will be encouraged to spend more. It just eggs them on.

Far from being an historic day, this is a dark day for public health policy.

One of the bribes that came out today was $800m for 500 hospital beds - that's $1.6m for a bed. I'm sure Gerry Harvey would love to tender for that job lot.

How in the hell does it cost $32m to build a room with 20 beds in it? Who in the hell makes up these neumbers? The same people who costed out covered areas in schools at half a million a pop?

What we've ended up with is
On the track
No track today. Spent the day out at the AIS.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and prepare for the time when I stop writing about this stuff.

John Miller

http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/

http://www.globalbackcare.com/

BIGGEST LOSER - Monday 19th April 2010

2010-04-21T20:21:00.000-07:00

A big day to day in Canberra with COAG coagulating all day over a new national hospitals policy and the Biggest Loser final on TV.

And what a final it was.

Winner can laugh and losers can please themselves.

All the people who started out in the show, including those who were kicked off at some stage were all acting like biggest losers. If you want to feel good, drop half a dozen dress sizes and get a hole punch for your belt.

Last week Chairman Rudd made an announcement of momentous proportions.

The Commonwealth Government will give $400m for doctors to monitor patients with diabetes. Hello! How useful is that? About as useful as a hip pocket on a singlet. Another farce, repeated over as tragedy.

You can't fix a fitness problem in a surgery.

If every diabetic had to go to a Biggest Loser program for a month for a fitness, diet and motivation program, the incidence of adult onset diabetes would drop through the floor. Doctors would have the seat out of their trousers, drug company shares would plummet, the International Diabetes Institute could fold up and Paul Zimmett would be enjoying retirement.

Imagine $400 to the fitness industry to get unfit, unhealthy people back into good shape. Not on your nelly.

The other big ticket item on the COAG agenda is mental health. The medical lobby is lobbying furiously for - you guessed it - more money.

Now I don't want to make light of the black dog of (clinical) depression, but, recognising that a significant component of depression is metabolically generated, a month at a biggest loser program would be a lot more beneficial for most people than a slab of Zoloft.

In the long run, exercise is a more powerful antidote to depression that a selective serotonin uptake reinhibitor.

I'm never quite sure what 'untake reinhibitor' means, but I presume it means 'booster'.

I can't get anyone to tell me how I can measure whether my brain is lacking in serotonin either. It seems a strange thing that a person can go into a surgery and after 20 minutes come out with a prescription for something to boost their serotonin levels without knowing whether the amount of serotonin in their brain has dropped to a dangerously low level.

I've written to the mercurial trick cyclist, Ian Hickie but this is one bit of correspondence he doesn't seem to want to answer. He told me to get in touch with Beyond Blue. Beyond Blue tells you to ask your doctor! The shrink in the next block gave me the brush off; told me not to worry about it.

Anyway to get back to the Biggest Loser they had clips of these people talking about themselves before they started the program. Definitely a miserable bunch at their wits end as to what to do.
And then, three months later they're all jumping out of their skins. In fact some had jumped so far out of their skin they'd lost over 40% of their body weight.

So, there it is, two birds killed with one stone. People back into good shape and feeling absolutely fantastic.

Meanwhile the Commonwealth Government's response to a diabetes problem will be to 'let them eat Gliclazide and Lipitor. Their answer to a depression problem will be to 'let them eat Zoloft.'

This is what happens when you put the foxes in charge of the hen house.

On the track
Out for the morning jog today with the boys. Felt good, didn't push it.

In the meantime stay tuned highly tuned and wait for the Prime Minister to wipe the floor with the Premiers and Chief Ministers at tomorrow's continued COAG meeting. The ACT Chief Minister is already lying on his back with his legs in the air.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.,com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

AGE CARE Sunday 18th April 2010

2010-04-21T17:01:00.000-07:00

Look after the young people, they've got a long way to go.

Look after the old people they've come a long way.

But, that doesn't mean you have to do every thing for them.

A lot of these people are very well off. When my mother, Doreen died, she could buy and sell a lot of people. This was a women who never did any paid work after she was married, who together with my dad did a good job of feeding and watering four boys. Bert and Doreen looked after their finances and there was enough left over for the boys to top up their super at the end of it.

For the last 10 years of her lifeDoreen was in a nursing home, holding on valiantly until she was 92. I think she would have liked to go a few years earlier but apparently you're not allowed to.

In one of my last conversations with her I asked her what the meals were like. She said, 'Not bad, but I've only been here a few days!'

There is this impression in the public mind that old equals poor.

Not so. There are hundreds and thousands of people who are quite well off living in nursing homes who don't need any support.

If you stay in your own home until your 95 you look after yourself. If you get wheeled into a nursing home when you're 80 you can expect to be looked after by the State, regardless of your financial, circumstances. Seems a strange set up to me.

The other policy initiative we're lacking is active support and encouragement of that dreadful practice what cannot speak its name but goes under the code word of 'youth in Asia!'

I'm thinking about getting a bottle of Nembutal when next I go overseas. The problem is, by the time I want to use it I'll have probably forgotten where I left it.

Come Monday the Commonwealth Government will have tipped another billion dollars into nursing homes. Proprietors and nursing home staff will be licking their chops.

On the track
A very good workout. Almost made level 8 on the stepper for 40 minutes - got over 800 steps, which means good shape. 607 Calories will also act as a handy buffer for the night before.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and don't get old too soon.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

RUDD PULLS CUNNING STUNT- Saturday17th April 2010

2010-04-21T16:20:00.000-07:00

I read in the paper today that the Prime Minister has been racing around every marginal electorate in the country giving hand-outs to hospitals as a way of getting publicity in the local rag, radio and TV.

What we've seen every evening is a 30 second grab on his big new health policy in which he wants to bribe the State Governments into letting the Commonwealth Government take over more of the funding for medical care.

At the same time as he's been doing that he's been bribing the local electorates with a bit of equipment for the local hospital. It's an unbeatable strategy and a marvellous vote winner. You have to tgake your hat off to the man. Some of these towns haven't seen a Prime Minister for donkey's years. It was big event. He's as smooth as a desert boot.

The man is as cunning as the proberbial SHR.

Everyone thought John Howard was cunning. Rudd is matching him stoke for stroke.

The other point is that he seems indefatiguable. They say he doesn't sleep much. He can get up early, be a couple of thousand miles away by 9am and back in time for lunch. James, James Morrison's mother would never have been able to keep up with schedule.

I would think that if you don't sleep much and you're focused there would be a good chance that you could climb a lot of tall mountains and maybe even leap over the odd tall building.

On the track
On the stepper, for 30 minutes. 557 steps and 426 calories.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and keep a very close eye on people who climb high mountains and leap over tall buildings.

John Miller
Fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackare.com

THE BIG ISSUE - Friday 9th May 2010

2010-04-21T15:35:00.000-07:00

When ever I see someone selling copies of the Big Issue I make a point of buying one. I admire people who are getting up from being down on their uppers, who are out there doing something to turn a quid; much admire. Thyey are engaging and optimistic. They like their customers (which is more than I can say for the woman who makes the coffees at the local McDonalds' cafe.) I also make a point of paying them what I think the magazine is worth, if you know what I mean.

The big issue coming up on Monday is

'as the Council of Australian Government what can we do to improve the health,

fitness and wellbeing of Australians?'

That should be a very good debate between out Prime Minister, the Premiers and Chief Ministers that could run for a few days at least.

Instead what will we get? A program to pour more money down the medical black hole.

Will it change the face of medical care for the better? Nope.

Will anyone become fitter and healthier? Nope.

Will we have to go through the same rigmarole next year? Yep.

On the track

Went out with the boys. Had a slight twinge on the right calf a few days ago, but seemed to be holding up a bit better this morning. Jogged, not ran.

I think that using 'The Stick' to massage my calves and loosen them up has been a good thing. In fact I'd recommend it. That and an ice pack down the back of my neoprene anklets.

You can purchase 'The Stick' at www.thestick.com.au

In the meantime stay tuned highly tuned and remember, history repeats itself, first as tragedy and then as farce.

John Miller

www.fitandheathyonline.com

www.globalbackcare.com

BRUMBY WEAK AT THE KNEES - Thursday 8th April 2010

2010-04-21T14:02:00.000-07:00

Victorian Premier John Brumby is complaining that his State is funding 60% of the cost of running hospitals. The Commonwealth Government is paying 'only' 40%. He wants the Commonwealth Government to pay 50%.

Well there's an easy way to redress the imbalance; the Victorian Government can spend less of its budget on hospital funding.

At the moment the Victorian Government is allocating 28% of its budget to the medical industry. It's unsustainable, it's unnecessary. It's bankrupting the State and starving other areas of government responsibility of money.

The same thing is happening in the other States.

The main problem? People in dreadful shape are getting a free run into the hospital. It's an unsustainable problem.

The Prime Minister thinks the problem can be solved by throwing more Commonwealth Government money at it. He has another think coming.

Brumby and the rest of the Premiers don't have the intestinal fortitude to say 'No' to the medical industry, 'No' to people who can afford hospital care, now or in the future and cut back on their budget for medical care.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and mark my words, next year we'll go through this whole process again.

On the track
No track. Spent the day with a Seven Habits of Fit and Healthy seminar group out at the AIS. Not quite sufficient, but it's a long day and it will do. Did have a healthy morning tea (fruit) and a very healthy AIS salad lunch.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

ECONOMISTS GO TO GROUND Wednesday 7th April

2010-04-21T13:38:00.000-07:00

In all the debate about a 'new' health system we haven't heard a peep out of the economics industry. They've gone to ground.

We haven't heard a word from the Productivity Commission. They're not allowed to delve into the machinations of the medical industry or analyse the effectiveness of the protection this industry gets from Australian Governments. It's a no go zone.

A couple of heads have appeared over the parapet, one of them being John Deeble, architect of the Medicare system. What a dreadful edifice that turned out to be. To create a system where the medical and welfare systems were inextricably linked lacked a supreme amount of foresight. In terms of money wasted, Medicare will go down in history as the most wasteful and counterproductive government program ever run.

A program designed to provide poor people with free access to med cal treatment became a program designed to provide all people with free access to medical treatment. Millions of snouts went into the medical trough. Doctors incomes soared. It became a right, not a privilege.

On top of that, it just so happened that Medicare coincided with an exponential decrease in health, fitness and wellbeing.

Hospitals became full to over flowing.

The Rod Laver Government is now hell bent on devising a way to prop the system up by throwing more money at it. Nothing, however will stop the flood of people wanting to go to hospital.

The financial arrangements between the Commonwealth and the states will be tipped on their head as the Commonwealth takes GST money from the states, gives it back to run hospitals and says it's now contributing more to medical funding.

It's a legerdemain, a hoax, a swifty.

If Rudd gets away with it he'll be able to get away with anything.

On the track
Morning walk, shuffle and jog.

In the meantime well may we say God save the ego of the Prime Minister because nothing will save the hospital system.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

MEDICAL INSURANCE Tuesday 6th April 2010

2010-04-13T17:20:00.000-07:00

Australia needs a first party compulsory medical insurance. If it's good enough for the car industry it's good enough for the medical industry.

Exempt children. The Government can pay for them. Then you can get rid of community rating and family rates.

Every adult needs to pay their share of compulsory, first party health insurance. Forget the family cover.

Rate the premiums against risk
Each adult needs to be insured - with the premium rated against risk. That might sharpen a few people up!

Pensions can be increased by an amount equivalent to the amount required to pay a basic health insurance cover - with no frills - like sandshoes and gym memberships.

It would cost each person about a couple of Grand a year.

All adults need to pay into a fund - with the fees of those unable to pay being paid by the Government on a Medical Contribution Scheme basis. The Government either gets reimbursed when people's income rises, or it's take out of their estate when they die. If there is no estate, then so be it. That's welfare.

On the track
No track today. Left early to spend the day lecturing at the AIS.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and keep yourself in good shape. You'll save money on health insurance.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com.

SPIRIT OF ADVENTURE - Monday 5th April 2010

2010-04-13T17:10:00.001-07:00

It's Lisa's (my daughter) birthday.

She's up in Brisbane with her husband, Ian and the two little boys Jackson and Harry.

Christine and I are down in Tomakin talking it easy.

Lisa and the boys pent a few days with us in Canberra recently.

The first thing she did was take a drawer with plastic plates and containers out of the cupboard and stick it on the floor for Harry to play with. As a crawling 15 month old he was like a pig in mud. Kept him busy for house. She's resourceful as well as being adventurous that second daughter of mine.

I'll have to work out a way so we can spend more time with each other.

We spoke on the phone. She and the family were camping for the weekend. She's the Spirit of Adventure.

On the track
Went for a walk around the course we ran around yesterday. I'm a bit stiff actually. Then had a hit of tennis. Got a twinge and had to pull out.

The softening process seems to be taking its toll on my body.

I'm determined not to weaken.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and spend more time playing tennis and visiting your grandchildren.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

NEW MEDICAL CONTRIBUTION SCHEME Sunday 4th April 2010

2010-04-13T17:05:00.000-07:00

The Government needs to establish a medical equivalent of the Higher Education Contribution Scheme (HECCS) - a Medical Contribution Scheme (MCS) for people who can't afford to go to hospitals and who don't have health insurance.

It needs a good safety net. We need to save people from bankruptcy just because the dice was loaded against them. On the other hand if they put in the bullets and cock the gun themselves that's a different matter. I'm unsure how to deal with that.

With the Hospital contribution scheme people can pay it off over time, or have deductions taken out of their pay packet (just like HECCS) or at the end of their life it can come out of their estate. If there is no estate, if there isn't sufficient income to pay it, then so be it. That's essential welfare that we don't deny people in our society.

There are people quite willing to pay $5,000 to register their car, service it and allow for depreciation, who aren't prepared to look after themselves - and don't want to pay anything for medical care. That's a nonsense. The Government needs to put an end to that.

Whoever invented the policy that says people going to public hospitals don't need to pay a cent wants their head read. Tell me what other government service comes without a fee? If governments want to keep the public hospitals (and they'd be stupid if they did) then they'd make sure people were sent an account. Their inability to pay that account is a welfare matter, not a health matter. It falls into the same basket as those people who can't afford to pay their electricity account.

On the track
Went for a 30 minute run along the beach and around Tomakin with The Decameron. Pulled up a little stiff but put the ice on my Achilles for the rest of the day.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and take more holidays.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

IF YOU LIE DOWN WITH DOGS - Satuary 3rd April 2010

2010-04-13T14:58:00.000-07:00

Big story in the Weekend Australian.

Medical researcher, Associate Professor John Eden, MB BS MD UNSW, FRCOG, FRANZCOG, CREI, is complaining that one of the drug companies who paid for some of his research has dudded him.

What does he expect?

Well for a start you can expect the piper to call the tune - at least some of the time.

Secondly, if you lie down with dogs you can expect to get fleas.

The good doctor has form. Here's the list of drug companies he's been leeching money out of: - Pfizer, Lawley Pharmaceuticals, Organon, Eurovita Ltd Denmark, Naturopathica, Eli Lily, Merck Sharp Dohme Pharmaceuticals. There's a lot of trips in there! He's a serial applicant for drug company funds. He's got his hand well and truly in the honey pot. He's not a babe in the woods. He knows exactly what the rules are. The drug companies have certainly not set a trap for a young player here.

He must either be naive of dreaming if he thinks the drug companies are running a charity. (If he's like most medical researchers, he will probably know that the NH&MRC is running a charity. They run a bottomless well for people like Dr Eden.

He's on the front cover of the paper bleating about the fact that he's the victim of drug company deviousness. I can tell you one thing, if it happened to me I'd keep my trap shut. You wouldn't want to shit in your own pocket.

The good doctor (MB BS MD UNSW, FRCOG, FRANZCOG, CREI) is a busy boy and I would have thought from the list of committees and research interests he's involved with that he knew how to look after himself. He's been riding the gravy train for years doing research into menopause. It's a big game. He's a serious player. If he doesn't know the rules, if it's too hot in the kitchen he should go back to the surgery.

When you look at the list of research projects and committees you might wonder how he has time to do any research at all.

Memberships
1. Society for Endocrinology (UK).
2. International Society of Reproductive Medicine.
3. Australian Fertility Society.
4. Australasian Menopause Society.
5. International Society of Gynaecological Endocrinology
6. Australian and New Zealand Bone and Mineral Society.
7. Endocrine Society of Australia
8. International Menopause Society.
9. Australian Gynaecological Endoscopy Society.
10. North American Menopause Society
11. American Society for Reproductive Medicine.
12. Australian New Zealand Breast Cancer Trials Group.
13. Australian Society for Paediatric and Adolescent Gynaecology.
14. Asia Pacific Menopause Federation.Participation in professional societies

Most of these organisations are fronts for drug companies. They employ people like Eden to give talks at silver service dinners to mug GP's.

Professional societies
1. Editor of "Changes", the Australasian Menopause Society's magazine, 1991-2003
2. Committee member Australasian Menopause Society, 1992-2003
3. Committee member NSW state committee Royal Australian College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, 1993- 1997
4. Reviewer for Maturitas, journal for the International Menopause Society, 1994 -
5. Reviewer for Clinical Endocrinology, 1994-
6. NH&MRC assessor 1994-
7. RACOG member on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Advisory Committee on Osteoporosis, 1995.
8. Member of the scientific committee for the organising committee of the 8th International Menopause Society Meeting, Sydney 1996.
9. Anti-Cancer Council of Victoria assessor, 1996-
10. RACOG appointee on the Australian Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association Complaints Committee, 1996 -
11. Reviewer for the Lancet, 1996-1
2. National advisor for the Breast Cancer Institute, 1996-
13. External reviewer for the Cochrane Collaboration Menstrual Disorders Group 1996-
14. Reviewer for International Journal of Cancer, 199715. Reviewer for the Medical Research Council (Britain), 1997
16. Reviewer for the Australian Journal of Nutrition and Dietetics, 1997
17. Reviewer for Diabetologia, 1997
18. Reviewer for Menopause Digest, 1998
19. Reviewer for American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, 1998-
20. Reviewer for the Medical Journal of Australia, 1998-
21. Reviewer for Climacteric, 1998-
22. Reviewer for Cancer Foundation of Western Australia, 1998-
23. Reviewer, Australian Medicines Handbook, 1998.
24. Member of the examination committee of the Reproductive Endocrine and Infertility subcommittee of the RANZCOG.
25. Member of the Scientific Committee of the 9th International Menopause Society, Yokohama, Japan, 1999.
26. Committee member of Working party of the North American Menopause Society examining the role of isoflavones on menopausal health.
27. Media committee, Australasian Menopause Society, 2000-
28. Executive council member of NEDA (National Estrogen Deficiency Awareness) - an international body which aims to educate women about menopause.
29. Member of the scientific committee of the Australian Osteoporosis Campaign
30. Member of the AMA committee on complimentary medicine, 2001
31. Member of the Editorial Board, Australiasian Journal Of Integrative Medicine, 2000-
32. Reviewer for The Wellcome Trust, UK. 2000-33. Reviewer for the Journal of the North American menopause Society, 2000-
34. Board member on the Editorial Advisory Board of the Australiasian Journal of Integrative Medicine. 2001-
35. Reviewer for the South African National Research Foundation, 2002
36. Reviewer for Urological research, 2004
37. Reviewer for Australian Family Physician 2004
38. Reviewer for the Journal of complimentary medicine 2004-
39. Referee for Clinical Endocrinology, 1995-
40. Anti-Cancer of Victoria assessor, 1996
41. Reviewer for the South African National Review Board, 2002.
42. Reviewer for the Wales (UK) Office of Research and Development for Health and Social Care (WORD) Research Funding Scheme 2007.

There's a lot of back scratching in that lot. Did you noice he's an assessor for the NH&MRC; - you review my paper or my research application and I'll review yours. Then I'll invite you over to present a paper. You can even spend a few months with us. We can go skiing. Then you can invite me to spend a few months with you. We can go skiing. I'll give my mates a call at Fizzer, Roach and Smerk.

I'm glad it's the drug companies that are paying his salary, though I bet he's got his snout in the NH&MRC trough as well.

I bet he doesn't give many lectures, sit in on many tutorials or mark many exam papers at the University either.

From the look of the memberships and committee's you know his focus is on junk medicine, along with all the back slapping , brown nosing, head patting, silver service dining, Grange Hermitage quaffing, and trips down the pointy end of planes that come with drug company sponsored medical research.

It never ceases to amaze me how much money is poured into menopause research. If women kept themselves in exceptionally good shape and ate the right sort of food if wouldn't be all that much of an inconvenience. It doesn't seem to be too much of a problem for women living in Asia as it does in Australia.

What's happened in the Western world is that the drug companies have medicalized menopause. Eden is riding the pharmaceutical gravy train. Every now and then he has to get his ticket punched. He complains about it to the papers.

I'm not really sure what he is actually complaining about, but I wouldn't think that the gravy train has been derailed or anything like that.

There was one point in the article that I do agree with and that's the use of statistics to pervert the course of science. The drug companies and FDA are all guilty of this deviousness.

Eden pointed out that the increased risk of heart attacks when taking some sort of menopausal drug was played up to be a huge increase in risk, when in fact the chances of having a heart attack went from 26 in 10,000 38 in 10,000. I've lost the article so I'm not exactly sure of the figures and I don't know what the time frame was. I would think most women would take a punt and hope to high heaven they weren't the 12 people in 10,000 who had a heart attack. No doubt the risk is higher for those with other risk factors.

On the track
No track today. Taking it easy at the beach, reading and snoozing.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and thank Christ for the opportunity to spend a few days at the beach.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

MEDICAL INDUSTRY RORTING AND GOUGING Friday 2nd of April 2010

2010-04-13T14:49:00.000-07:00

What ever the Government does it has to stop medical industry rorting and gouging and start to bring down the cost of medicine. As soon as people put on a white coat they think that have a license to slug hell out of their customers - knowing the Government will pay most of the cost.

Can anyone tell me why specialists are charging themselves out at between $5,000 and $10,000 a day - with most of the money coming from the Government purse?

This whole great medical debate hysteria being trumped up by the Prime Minister would evaporate if people were fitter and if the medical industry stopped gouging its customers and the taxpayer.

Rudd (and his shadow the Minister for Health) continues his romp through every hospital in the country just to get his face on the evening news. We still don't know exactly what it is he wants to take over or how it's going to improve the health of the community. How he gets his work done is beyond my comprehension.

On the track
Good Friday and the boys agreed to get out amongst it. Walked and ran in the dark.

Then went off to Tomakin for a weekend by the sea.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and don't expect a reply to the letter you sent to the Prime Minister. He's not in his office.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

MEDICAL RESEARCH - Thursday 1st of April 2010

2010-04-13T14:33:00.000-07:00

The NH&MRC is pouring all this money into metabolic health research. The health of the community is getting worse. If every medical researcher took just a couple of fitness classes a week they'd have a greater impact on community health than all the research you can poke a stick at.

Same with doctors. If every doctor supervised a fitness class before work three times a week, they'd make a huge difference to community health. I knew a doctor up on Thursday Island who did that. One woman lost 10Kg in a couple of months. I take my hat off to him - and to her.

The Government is pouring all this money into research institutions and people are getting unfitter and unhealthier by the day. Hello! The universities have turned applications for research grants into an art form.

It's a merry dance, particularly if you've got mates on the NH&MRC review panels.

The NH&MRC sent me a print out of all the people who get medical research money and for what projects. If you saw it you'd roll your eyes through to the back of your neck. It's just a big rort for the universities who've set up research institute by the dozen to attract funds. No doubt they cream a bit off the top for the Vice Chancellor's fund.

This is just one big gravy train to keep bread on the table of people working in sheltered workshops for the academically gifted. Most of this research is just busy work designed to fil;l up the pages of medical research jouirnals, suck up to drug companies and get tgrips overseas to deliver papers. This is a grand back patting, brown nosing, head patting industry.

People who have either got short memories, are two young to remember or read the wrong journals are redoing research that has already been done to death. Wheels are being re-invented. It's open slather. They've even got a research institute in Sydney researching fitness and diabetes and stuff for crissakes. It's been done. You can lower the glasses. The results are in. Go for a run, lift weights, take a holiday!

I've written to the head of the NH&MRC about all this roprting and feather bedding but he doesn't answer his correspondence.

If everyone kept themselves as fit and healthy as you do, we could cut the research budget by 80% and have these boffins out there doing something worthwhile. It's bunkum.

I don't know of any research into the personally-generated, lifestyle related body system dysfunctions that has had a greater impact than a broadcast email telling people to get off their bums and go for a run, or putting on the smugglers and going for a swim.

When less than 15% of people have a decent fitness training program, research into the metabolic and musculo-skeletal dysfunctions is wasted effort.

On the track
No track today. Instead a full day out at the AIS telling people about the Seven Habits of Fit and Healthy People. I enjoy these days.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and get a research job in a sandstone university.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

PHARMACEUTICALS Wednesday 31st March 2010

2010-04-13T13:35:00.000-07:00

If you want to put a brake on the cost of pharmaceuticals: -

1. put up the cost of the lifestyle induced medications - why should someone who's fat and
lazy get cheap access to diabetes, blood pressure and cholesterol medication?

2. Put out a tender for the three most effective and cheapest drugs the government will
subsidize for a particular dysfunction.

The pharmaceutical industry is absolutely rorting the Australian community, spending Government money to market drugs, not develop or produce them.

This is the industry that has perverted the course of medical research in this country.

It has also perverted the course of medicine, seducing doctors into the practice of junk medicine with free silver service dinners, Grange Hermitage and baubles.

On the track
Out for a walk/run with the boys. It's getting darker and darker. I just wish the Premiers would agree to end it at the end of February.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and get your tablets off the internet!

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

OUTDATED MEDICAL PRACTICES Tuesday 30th March 2010

2010-04-13T13:25:00.000-07:00

You can't skype your doctor or consult them by phone or email, the main reason being doctors haven't worked out a way to bill their customers for these types of consultations. Two thirds of them don't use their email account. Some don't even have one. How bad's that?

Instead everyone has to traipse through the surgery. It's time-consuming for the doctor and the customer. It's an expensive way to do business. The doctors and the community expect the government to pay most of the cost. Who was the dunce who thought that one up?

Doctors don't hold meetings to advise a whole lot of the clients at the one time. Instead of seeing people one at a time they should hold meetings for groups of people with chronic dysfunctions, like crook backs, high blood pressure, diabetes ...

Around May, along with a couple of nurses they should invite every one along to a meeting to tell them what to do when they have a cold or the flu, and take the opportunity to give everyone a jab at the same time. Information doesn't have to be dispensed one person at a time.

I don't know of any doctors who have website to give out advice. I bet there's not a lot of doctors blogging and tweeting their opinions to their customers.

It's just a hopelessly outdated industry. It's what happens when an industry gets given monopoly states and a high level of protection.

I wrote to Tony Abbott and said 'Tony, if I'm not wrong, under your stewardship, doctors were given more money to develop special plans for people who were depressed. That role should have been passed over to counsellors and psychologists. The doctors just want to drug them and get them out of the surgery. Next!

On the track

I don't think there was a track today. I'm getting slack.

In the meantime stay tuned and if you're feeling shidouse skype your doctor.

John Miller

http://www.fitandhealthyyponlinme.com/

http://www.globalbackcare.com/

JUNK MEDICINE Monday 29th March 2010

2010-04-13T13:16:00.000-07:00

We've got this huge debate about the funding of hospital care.

It's generally the case that the cause of the problem is not at the site of the problem.

In this case, the protection of the grass roots branch of the medical industry has created a demand for public money that is insatiable. If they were doing a half decent job hospitals would be empty.

It is poor general practice that has people end up in the hospital. If you give people drugs to mask symptoms, eventually the underlying condition gets so bad people need surgery.

You definitely don't need more doctors in this country.

Nurses can do 20% of the work
Fitness practitioners can do 20% or more of the work
Counsellors can do 20% of the work
Naturopaths can do another 20% of the work.

Encouraging people to go to the doctor as the first point of primary care is just plain nonsense. It's an outdated, expensive and ineffective practice. It is not best care. It's like sending people to David Jones when all they want is a bag of chips.

The GP primary care monopoly is not working. The effect is more and more people turning up at hospitals with dysfunctions made worse by the wrong treatment prescribed by general practitioners.

There are many providers of primary care. The current monopoly protection of the Medical industry has downplayed the role these other providers have the primary care of various complaints.

Doctors have abused the privilege of being the first point of primary care. It's an outdated notion.

If you've got a crook back go to you local gym.

If you feel shidouse go to a counsellor - and the gym

If you've got a baby with a sniffle, if you've got the flu and need a certificate, if you need blood drawn for pathology, if you need a jab, a stitch or a bandage, go to a nurse in private practice.

Case in point. The Minister for Health is telling people to go to their doctor for a flu injection. Why is the precious time of doctors being take up by jabbing people in the arm? This is nurses' work.

Pharmacists should be having a greater say in what's prescribed. How stupid is it for doctors to prescribe a drug when they don't know as much about drugs as chemists. Chemists should have a lot more say in the prescription of medicine and the issuing of repeats.

Chemists should be playing a greater role in stamping out doctor shopping for addictive drugs. They stand idly by when they know doctors are mis-prescribing and over-prescribing.

DEMARCATION DISPUTES
The medical industry is holding the community to ransom with demarcation disputes that put those in other industries to shame.

For instance a radiologist can't diagnose the cause of a crook back. That's the doctor's job.

Doctors won't refer people to nurses, fitness practitioners, counsellors or naturopaths.

Doctors won't keep a few basic drugs in the surgery to dole out to their customers.

On the track
Out with the boys for the walk/run.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and go for a run around the block.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

PAY BY RESULTS - Sunday 28th March

2010-04-13T13:11:00.000-07:00

Have you every heard of anything more stupid than paying doctors to help their customers restore poor health to good - but achieving quite the opposite effect.

The GP's are being paid by input, not output. They don't have standards of care they need to achieve.

How's that?

What's best practice in this industry?

To whom are they accountable?

This is just a gravy train with no care and no responsibility. All this money going to GP's to improve people's health and the health of their customers is getting worse. The Government loves it. They keep protecting the industry and pay them to do more of the same.

INDUSTRY STANDARDS
We need some health and fitness standards here, something for the medical industry to live up to. Currently this industry is not accountable to anyone, for anything. Millions of dollars are going down the black hole. The wrong industry is in charge of health.

We need yearly surveys to tell us whether the health and fitness of the population is getting better or worse.

Currently the Australian Bureau of Statistics doesn't measure heath, fitness and wellbeing. Neither does the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. Fitness is well and truly off their radar.

At the moment community health and fitness is getting worse because the Government money is going to the wrong people.

On the track
30 minutes on the stepper.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and don't go to the doctor for things doctors can't fix.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

HOSPITALS - A note to Kevin Rudd - Saturday 27th March

2010-04-13T13:05:00.000-07:00

Sell off the big public hospitals. The only hospitals that may need to be publicly owned are those in small towns that nobody wants to buy. Fund Local Government to run them. Forget the setting up of hospital boards. They'll end up being run by a medical industry. Why would you leave the medical system in the hands of a professional group that has put us in the current mess?

There is no more reason for governments to run hospitals than there is for them to run airlines, power stations and banks.

All the Commonwealth Government has to do is work out how to protect the needy, the chronically ill and those who are just unable to pay their accounts. It's a welfare problem, not a health problem and you solve it through the welfare system.

You don't need to protect the fat, the lazy, the unfit and those who won't lift a finger to help themselves.

It’s time the Government wiped its hands of this mess. Sell off the hospitals. Let someone else take the blame for stuffing them up. It will be an enduring legacy.

Put out a tender. Bring in the merchant banks and float them off. Sell the hospitals off to organisations who can run them properly - this won't be bumbling medical organisations.

Case in point.

I was at the John James hospital in Canberra last Saturday and Sunday and there's nobody there. It was like a morgue. They only work 9 - 5, Monday to Friday. No wonder they're going broke. They need Jerry Harvey and the people who run the big mining companies in there to sort them out.

The hospitals have become bloated. They're full of hangers on, people doing junk research. Whatever the specialists say, the hospitals are not lean fighting machines. A lot of the staff are in poor shape.

On the track
An easy 30p minutes on the stepper.

In the meantime stay tuned and don't get sick on the weekend.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

PRIMARY HEALTH CARE - Friday 26th March 2010

2010-04-13T12:59:00.000-07:00

Primary health care in this country is a dead duck.

It is an outdated notion to have doctors as the sole gate keepers of primary health care. The government has created a monopoly that has become increasingly irrelevant in the treatment of the personally-generated, lifestyle-related body system dysfunctions.

It’s time the Government started protecting fitness practitioners, naturopaths counsellors, psychologists and anyone involved in personal development.

These people should be on the front line of primary care as well as doctors. They don't need a doctor to open the gate for them. If it's not a medical problem, people should be going elsewhere. It's cheaper and more effective treatment.

Put more money in to schools for PhysEd, sport and outdoor education.

On the track
Out with the boys for the early morning walk and run.

I just can't wait for daylight saving to end. It was as black as the inside of a black cow when we started this morning.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and open the primary health care gates.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

BEYOND BLUE - BEYOND REDEMPTION - Thursday 25th March 2010

2010-04-13T12:30:00.000-07:00

ADOLESCENT DEPRESSION GUIDELINES
Beyond Blue recently commissioned Adelaide Health Technology Assessment (AHTA) to conduct systematic literature reviews to provide the evidence base for adolescent depression guidelines. The review aimed to identify risk and protective factors for depression, how depression can be prevented and treated, and how risk factors have an impact on outcomes in the population of adolescents and young adults.

It’s another vapid, useless and potentially dangerous report. It gives the nod to the medical industry to run amok with the preseciption pad. It trivializes the causes and treatments of depression.

The big recommendation:

‘For young people with moderate to severe major depressive disorder, SSRIs in combination with CBT/IPT are recommended. Close monitoring of possible side effects and suicidal ideation is important. A multidisciplinary team approach is likely to have advantages for individuals with complex and/or highly comorbid presentations.’

'Given the lack of evidence in young adults, it is strongly recommended that strategies to prevent major depressive disorder in this age group be a focus for continuing research.'

'Further work is required to match a specific target groups with a particular intervention; for example, young people with biological risk factors (eg chronic illness) may benefit from a psychological intervention while parent risk factors (eg parent death) or social factors (eg homelessness, poverty) may require systemic interventions.'

'Best practice in assessment occurs within the context of a health professional (code for doctor) experienced in dealing with adolescents and young adults, who has appropriate communication skills, is culturally competent and is able to gain the trust of the young person.'

'The first aim of assessment is to determine whether a depressive disorder is present and its level of severity. The assessment process includes:

• greeting the young person and establishing the parameters of the assessment;

• establishing rapport, often by taking an interest in the life of the young person beyond their current difficulties — this may also be an appropriate time to identify the individual’s strengths.'

'It should be noted that particularly in moderate to severe depression, concerns about the risk of increased suicidal ideation with SSRIs must be balanced against the risks of no treatment; data from observational studies indicates that while SSRIs may increase the risk of youth suicidality, they are likely to decrease the overall risk of youth suicide (see discussion in Dudley et al 2008). Observational studies have also found decreased suicidality with increased duration of antidepressant use (Simon et al 2006).'

Well there you go. Depression is caused by a lack of Zoloft! The risk of suicide is a dreadful;l side-effect. We need more research and further work.

The report outlines the adverse effects of SSRIs
Mania/hypomania
Irritable/depressed mood
Anxiety/panic
Sleep
Fatigue/sedation
Decreased appetite
Nausea
Agitation
Depression
Tachycardia
Tooth disorder
Hostility
Insomnia
Somnolence
Tremor
Respiratory disorder
Somnolence
Pharyngitis
Fever
Increased cough
Dyspepsia
Vomiting
Dizziness
Otitis media
Sweating
Contact dermatitis
Fatigue
Vomiting
Diarrhoea

Exercise
What the report had to say about the role of exercise in the treatment of depression was just plain wrong.

'Based on current evidence, exercise cannot be recommended as an effective treatment for
depression in adolescents or young adults.'

The report made no reference to personal development, the stress placed on children and youth from school work.

It didn’t mention the existential vacuum, or the role of anger in depression. No mention of the effect of diet and poo-pooing of the role of physical activity.

No mention of activities that focus on group cohesion and support - like sport, drama, bands …

These people are right off the planet. If this is all they can come up with, there is no hope for Beyond Blue to make any significant impact on the treatment of depression in youth and adolescents.

And why not? Because the committee is drawn from the medical and pharmaceutical industries.

Members
A/Prof Michael Baigent Beyond Blue Clinical Advisor
Dr Andrew Chanen Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
Ms Lesley Fraser Australian Guidance and Counselling Association
Dr Brian Graetz Beyond Blue Education and Early Childhood
A/Prof Noel Hayman Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP):
Professor Louise Newman RANZCP: Faculty of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
Dr Nikunj Parikh (as of 31 August 2009) Royal Australian College of General Practitioners
Ms Bernadette Peirce blueVoices consumers
Dr Jenny Proimos RACP: Paediatrics and Child Health Division
A/Prof Leanne Rowe (until 17 June 2009) Royal Australian College of General Practitioners
Ms Thelma Smalley blueVoices carers
Professor Sue Spence Australian Psychological Society
Ms Kay Currie NHMRC National Institute of Clinical Studies

They're relying on selective evidence.

No one there from the personal development, teaching or fitness industries. One lonely member of a counselling organisation. Why you'd put someone from the College of General Practitioners on the committee beggars belief. These are the people who prescribe the drugs with the list of side effects as long as you arm.

The contractors who did the dreadful job on the literature review were Tracey Merlin and Skye Newton from Adelaide Health Technology Assessment. They reviewed the wrong literature. And don't you love medical speak; words like 'ideation', 'suicidality' and 'comorbid' - makes it sound more important! The spell-checker went nuts.

This is most depressing report, ineptly prepared by mesdames Merlin and Newton. Even the Kinghts of the Round Table could have done a better job. If it were a year 10 assignment you'd give it 2/10 for trying.

Even more depressiong is the fact that the Board of Beyong Blue accepted and published it. They're a laughing stock.

It does nothing to make the plight of depressed adolescents any better. It just gives doctors the nod to prescribe more drugs, regardless of the side effects, regardless of whether this is the best way to assist young people to start living the life they'd like to live. If they're hyperactive give them Ritalin. If they're depressed give them Zoloft and tell them they'll be alright.

It's not alright, depression is not caused by a lack of Zoloft. It's just another example of junk medicine in action.

Anyone who's depressed shouldn't be allowed within a mile of a surgery.

The sooner Beyond Blue wakes up to itself and divorces itself from the medical and pharmaceutical industries as primary referral options for people who are depressed the better. Putting its name to a report like this does the community a grave disservice.

On the track
No track today. Another full day at the AIS. Have to leave early and get home late.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if you're depressed don't call Beyond Blue, they'll just tell you to go and see your doctor.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

HEALTH AND HOSPITALS COMMISSION REPORT - Wednesday 24th March 2010

2010-04-13T12:22:00.000-07:00

The Government is getting its marching orders from the Health and Hospitals Commission - comprised almost exclusively of medical industry hacks. Read the report. It's just vapid.

This is what happens when you put the foxes in charge of the hen house.

It's the wrong advice. It's selective.

Every year for the last 35 years, the medical industry has been getting another $2B or so of public money thrown at it - and the health of Australians has got progressively worse.

The medical industry, particularly at the general practitioner level has become a bloated, inefficient, ineffective, expensive, government supported monopoly. (People complain about the protection of the motor industry, but it's nothing compared with that provided to the medical industry.)

For some inexplicable reason, this is one industry the Productivity Commission and the ACCC won't go near.

The billions Rudd is planning to throw at it will end up in the medical and pharmaceutical black hole along with all the money that's preceded it. Waiting lists will continue to blow out because

1. people will become more and more dysfunctional

2. the treatment is free.

Next year we'll have the same debate, mark my words.

Whoever designed the system to give away free medical treatment was a complete dunce. It's a recipe for public bankruptcy. Every time someone complains about how bad the the infrastructure system is in NSW, it's because that State is spending 25% of its budget on medical services. There is no money left for anything else.

Enough is enough.

On the track
No track today. Spent the full day at the AIS running a corporate health program.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and remember, you don't make a bad system better by throwing money at it.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

THE RUDD - ABBOTT MEDICAL DEBATE A FIZZER - Tuesday 23rd of March 2010

2010-04-11T16:28:00.000-07:00

The great medical debate today was a complete fizzer.

Rudd just wants to satisfy his ego by pouring more money down the medical industry black hole Well, it's time someone told him that you can't make a bad system better by throwing more money at it.

Abbott, despite being health Minister for 5 years doesn’t have a policy yet. You’ll have to wait until the election. I don't think it's because he's lazy, he’s just not interested. He should be.

I'm yet to be convinced that his Shadow Minister is up to the job. You'd reckon he'd be champing at the bit with new policies, criticizing Rudd and Roxon, baring his teeth on television ... I haven't heard so much as a peep!

Abbott’s a fit man, an iron man. But he doesn't seem to be able to translate his own personal commitment to the fit and healthy way of life into public policy. He couldn’t do it while he was Minister for Health.

Unless I'm wrong, and I hope I am, I think we might just get more of the same while he’s the Leader of the Opposition. If past and present performance is any indication, about all we can expect is a few A4 pages of stuff to paper over the cracks, plus the odd nod and wink to the medical union and the Catholic Hospital crowd. They were all there at the great debate with their ears pinned back and frothing at the mouth. They reckon the honey pot is about to get a lot bigger.

I'm disappointed. I hope I'm wrong.

It’s a terrible shame.

On the track
No track today. Went to the dentist to have two teeth implants.

An hour and a half in the chair, cost $3,850. The woman on the front desk said to come back in a week and have the stitches out - for free. I said, ‘you’re kidding!’

Took a couple of valium-type pills before the operation. Knocked me right out. Didn’t feel a thing.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if you want a license to print money become a dentist.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

GREEDY MEDICAL INDUSTRY - Monday 22nd March 2010

2010-04-11T15:16:00.000-07:00

Since 1975 the medical industry has increasingly firmed its grasp on the short hairs of Australian governments.

It's currently pulling those hairs with greater and greater force using hospital waiting lists as its main weapon. More billions poured down the medical industry black hole over the last few years haven't made an iota of difference to the health of the community, or to hospital waiting lists, only in the bank balances of doctors and specialists. More and more people are flooding into the surgery and pharmacy. They’ve become very lucrative businesses - mainly at public expense.

It’s a poor investment on the part of the governments of Australia, very poor.

With every hospital bed that gets created, there will be more and more people to fill it. There will never be enough beds to cater for the demand of a population that it's becoming increasingly unhealthy. Enough is enough. Clear the slate. Start again.

What is currently happening is the medical industry is gearing itself up for more protection. The protection is currently valued at around $80B a year by the Commonwealth and the states - and goodness knows how many billions from the premiums people pay to private medical insurance companies and out of their brown pockets.

The medical industry has an insatiable appetite for public money and the service is getting worse. The customers are dropping like flies. It can't go on. We've reached a watershed.

Rudd does not recognise this. He's bringing out yet another Medicare 1975 Bandaid for a problem that needs radical surgery.

Let’s wait and see whether Abbott can pull something out of the hat and suggest something total radical to improve the health, fitness and wellbeing of Australians.

On the track
Went to the Stromlo track. Ran 5Km in 29.57. Pretty pleased with that after a long layoff while they repaired the track.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and every time you hear the Prime Minister and his shadow talking about health, keep in mind that what they’re really talking about is increasing the level of protection of the medical and pharmaceutical industries.

John Miller
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/
http://www.globalbackcare.com/

DON'T MENTION THE 'F' WORD - Sunday 21st March 2010

2010-04-11T15:12:00.000-07:00

As Rudd and Abbott tune themselves up for the great health debate, I can lay you London to a brick neither of them will mention the F word.

I’m talking, of course about fitness.

Whilst fitness would have to be just about the most important factor in the maintenance of good metabolic and musculo-skeletal health (and is implicated in good psychological health), the chances of it being measured in a surgery or a hospital are quite remote. The chances of it being improved in a surgery or pharmacy is even more remote.

When less the 10% of people have a half decent aerobic fitness training program you’d reckon aerobic fitness would be one of the first things your doctor would measure when you dropped by.

And when only 5% of people have a half decent strength and flexibility training program you’d reckon that anyone presenting with a crook back would find themselves on the floor before you could say ‘Bob’s your uncle’ demonstrating how strong and flexible they were.

Well, it doesn’t happen does it? And because it doesn’t, people frequently go away with the wrong prescription. If a lack of exercise is the problem, then more exercise is likely to be the solution.

Should fitness be measured in the surgery? I think so. If it’s commonplace to stand on the scales of justice, get your blood pressure taken, have blood drawn for a pathology sample and, in the case of a crook back, be sent to the radiologist for an X-ray, then why wouldn’t you expect a fitness assessment of some sort?

But having said all that, measuring how fit you are is just another one of the things you can do for yourself.

To measure how aerobically fit you are mark out two lines 20m apart, then see how many laps you can complete in 5 minutes. Men who can do 40 laps and women who can do 36 are not in bad shape. If you can’t reach those standards then there is a high likelihood that you’re metabolically challenged.

You can enhance your metabolic status with an aerobic training program.

In the beginning was the amble, then the amble became a walk and the walk became a shuffle, the shuffle became a jog and the jog became a run; or you might connect with the swimming pool, the bike or the cross-trainer.

To measure how strong you are see how many situps, pressups (men on the toes and women on the front of the thighs) and squats you can do in 30 seconds. If you can do 20 of each, you’re not in bad nick.

If you want to get stronger do these exercises regularly or go to the gym and lift weights.

As for flexibility, see if you can see if you can touch your toes and sit up straight.

If you want a posture, strength and flexibility assessment go to www.globalbackcare.com.

If you want to become more flexible join a yoga or Body Balance class.

You ask, ‘does age have anything to do with this?’ Well, yes it does. The older you are the longer you’ve had time to train! You’ll be able to give these standards a good shake well into your 60’s.

On the track
Spent a lazy 30 minutes on the stepper at level 6.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and hope that Tony Abbott will recharge the medical debate by starting a fitness revolution.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

MEDICARE 2010 - Saturday 20th March 2010

2010-04-11T15:10:00.000-07:00

Tony Abbott is gearing up to debate Rudd on medical care.

You can be pretty certain the debate won’t be about health it will be about Rudd wanting to take great control of the medical system to inflate his own ego - using GST money to do it.

I’ve written to Abbott saying he has two choices:

1. to reshape the health system for the next 40 years by establishing Medicare version 2010, or

2. prop up a creaking Medicare 1975 with a version 35 that's only slightly different from
Rudd’s version and which still costs taxpayer more money than Medicare 1975, version 34.

The great tragedy is that for the last 35 years the medical industry has diverted the attention of governments from 'health' to 'medicine'. As soon as you put doctors and economists in charge of a health system this is where the money goes.

Doctor visits have gone from 4 a year to 12 a year. Just how hopeless is the medical advice that stimulates more and more visits. If it was effective people would be becoming healthier and visiting the doctor less.

The percentage of GDP spent on medical services has doubled.

Government expenditure on medical welfare is now around $80B a year.

This medico-centric view of the world has overseen the most dramatic decline in community health in the history of this country.

Kevin Rudd will not talk about 'health'. He'll talk about 'medicine', in particular Medicare 1975, version 35 and the further protection of the medical industry. All he wants to do is pour more money into hospitals, thinking that will make everything better, solve all health problems.

It won't. It's more ambulances at the bottom of the cliff. Next year the medical begging bowls will be out again for another couple of Billion.

Rudd wants the Commonwealth to have a larger role in hospitals just to satisfy his own ego. Then, if it's like the other projects of this Government, they'll stuff it up. Who are these people thinking they can run hospitals better than anyone else, any better than they can run the ceiling insulation and school building programs?

The fact that Medicare 1975, version 1 was well intentioned didn't make it a good program. It was hastily conceived and poorly thought out. Whoever thought of attaching a welfare system to a medical system was a complete dill.

The delivery was dreadful. July 1st 1975 was the starting date for the greatest decline in the health of the Australian community since the landing of the First Fleet. And as the standard of health went down, medical expenditure increased - exponentially. It was the wrong model.

Rudd will make a poor system worse by throwing more money at it.

I told Abbott he’s got a once in a lifetime chance to build a new and better system.

I told him this was the big one - that he had a chance to bring about a revival of community health, fitness and wellbeing and save the Commonwealth and the States from going bankrupt.

I said the goal is to lower medical expenditure by giving people the opportunity and the incentive to improve their level of health and fitness.

By focusing on people becoming fit and healthy, the hospitals will look after themselves.

On the track
30 minutes on the stepper for 510 steps and 390 calories.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and from now on, every time you hear the Prime Minister and his shadow talk about health, you’ll know they’re taking about Medicare 1975, version 35.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

RUDD HOOKED ON TRAVEL - Friday 19th March 2010

2010-04-11T15:03:00.000-07:00

Kevin Rudd, with his Minister for Health lurking in the shadows has embarked on the most wasteful use of public time, public resources in the form of VIP aircraft, the creation of greenhouse gas, not to mention the time wasted by doctors, nurses and administrators in hospitals in the history of the country.

It beggars belief why these two can’t pump out press releases from their offices Canberra. The travel of the Prime Minister in particular must be having a serious effect on his capacity to manage the affairs of state.

It begs several questions.

Why is he doing it?

Why isn’t he leaving the heavy lifting to his Minister for Health? Maybe she's not up to the heavy lifting. Maybe he's driven by his own ego to make a mark before the next election.

Why are the two of them wasting their time traipsing through hospitals?

Why isn’t the Minister for Health spending time working out how to make people fitter and healthier so they don’t need to go within a bull’s roar of a hospital?

If this health policy was any good it would sell itself. Despite all the travel, no-one has a clue what it’s all about. It’s going to end up like the climate change policy and the broadband policy, a dead duck!

Fixing the hospitals is not a tough assignment.

All you have to do is send out accounts or float them off to private industry.

Stopping people from going to them in the first place seems to be the 800 lb gorilla in the room that no-one wants to do anything about, least of tall the Minister for Health who has just been presented with a report on preventive health.

On the track
No track this morning. Left home early to conduct a one day Seven Habits of Fit and Healthy people seminar at the Australian Institute of Sport.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and if you’re in a hospital make room for the Prime Minister to park himself on your bed.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

KEVIN RUDD:THE THE BIGGEST LOSER - Thursday 18thg March 2010

2010-04-11T15:00:00.000-07:00

Kevin Rudd’s at it again. Another day, other hospital to announce a new diabetes initiative: $430million to go to doctors so that can better monitor customers with diabetes.

That’s just one hell of a lot of money to pour down the medical black hole. Where in the hell do they pluck these numbers from? Who in the Department of Health is plucking them?

Surely when people have diabetes they front up to the doctors and pay their account as per normal. You don’t need more money for that.

The thing I’m really critical of is the fact that Rudd and the Minister for Health (lurking in his shadow) think that going to the doctor constitutes best practice for the treatment of the diabetic form of metabolic dysfunction.

How can it be when going to the surgery didn’t stop it from happening in the first place? This is just another of the personally-generated, lifestyle-related body system dysfunctions that the medical industry doesn’t have a clues about.

What can people expect - another sermon on losing weight, eating more bread and ambling around the block a few times a week? And who takes any notice? I’ll tell you who takes notice; nobody.

I’ve got a mate who’s suddenly found out he’s got diabetes. He’s 30 Kg over weight for starters. Then he told me he’s going to the gym once a week. He’s dreaming. Whoever put him up to that knows nothing about exercise as a treatment for metabolic dysfunction. They need their head read.

It’s just the wrong treatment. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Where does Rudd get this advice from? How is this money going to make on diabetic customer fitter and healthier. They’ll just get fed more junk medication that won’t go within a bull’s roar of restoring poor function to good.

Rudd should be spending $430m sending people to the Biggest Loser for a couple of months.

On the track.

What track!

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and wait for the Prime Minister and his shadow to spend an hour in a hospital near you.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.globalbackcare.com

$630 MILLION TO TRAIN MORE DOCTORS -Wednesday 17th March 2010

2010-03-17T19:09:00.000-07:00

This week the peripatetic Kevin Rudd was at a baby kissing event to announce that the Government will plonk $630m on the table to train more doctors.

Why?

1. Don't the medical undergraduates already pay a fortune in HECCS?

2. Aren't they just herded into large lecture theatres with one lecturer to learn how to look up Index Medicus?

Training medical students doesn't sound like an expensive exercise to me. Many would be better off doing a two year TAFE course and then apprenticed to a doctor and a hospital. In 4 or 5 years they'd come out with a fair idea about the common complaints and what to do to restore poor health to good.

3. Aren't there more effective and less expensive ways of treating people than in a surgery.

As I mentioned yesterday, if nurses, fitness practitioners, naturopaths and counsellors were given access to Medicare the country would be a lot fitter and healthier, hospitals would be half empty and the Government could cut medical expenditure in half.

Rudd is racing around the country, throwing more bad money after worse and propping up a bloated, inefficient and expensive industry. It's obscene.

On the track
Walking and running again. Nothing to write home about but calves and Achilles feeling better. Am using The Stick to massage my calves, morning and night. Seems to be useful. You can read more about The Stick on this link http://www.thestick.net/

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and tell Kevin Rudd that he can't solve health, fitnes and wellbeing problems by pouring money down the medical black hole.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.back-pain-cause.com
http://www.globalbackcare.com/achilles-tendon-pain/index.html

NURSES MUSCLE IN ON DOCTORS Tuesday 16th March 2010

2010-03-17T17:39:00.000-07:00

Some very good news has come to hand.

The Minister for Health has given nurses the go-ahead to start doing some of the work doctors have been doing and getting a Medicare rebate for the pleasure.

This is exceptionally good news. Nurses are quite capable of doing a lot of the work doctors are doing.

The doctors are pissed off; as well the may. Their cosy, protected monopoly looks like being ripped apart. This is the thin edge of a wedge that hopefully will forge a gap that you'll soon be able to drive a truck through.

But to a large degrees, doctors are people with long and expensive medical degrees dabbling in health, fitness and well being, disciplines for which they are not trained and about which they don't have a clue. Running amok with the pad doesn't fix any of the great dysfunctions of our time - metabolic, musculo-skeletal or psychological.

The doctors can't have it both ways. They can't complain about being overworked and then not pass off some of their busy work onto people who can do the job better.

I'll give you a case in point.

According to the NH&MR, 95% of lower back pain is not a serious medical condition. The risk is that you may have a tumour, or something wrong with your kidneys, but to repeat, in 95% of cases the pain is caused by muscles somewhere in the body dragging bones in the spinal; column out of alignment.

(Actually doctors don't know this simple principle. They think the cause of the pain is the herniated disc and send you off to the surgeon to cut the disc out. (No wonder hospitals are bursting at the seems.) They don't have a cause for the herniated disc.)

So if you've got a crook back - go to the gym and get a good set of exercises.

If you've got any of the metabolic dysfunctions - high cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes (type 2) , go to the gym as well and work out like buggery.

If you feel shidouse, go to the counsellor, the gym and the naturopath. Steer clear of the doctor, you'll just come away with a drug to paper over your anger/disappointment/grief/vacuity, poor health, lack of energy and vitality ...

On the track
Spent 30 minutes on the stepper at levels 6,7, and 8. A better workout, but not busting my boiler.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and remember; doctors would have their work cut by 70% if the government gave some Medicare numbers to nurses, counsellors, fitness practitioners and naturopaths. The community would be a whole lot fitter. Thank Mrs Roxon for making a start with the nurses.

John Miller
www.fitandhealthyonline.com
www.fix-back-pain.com