Pumping Marvellous

Crescendo to Heart Month

In our commitment to ensuring children and young people start their lives with the best possible education we have teamed up with on Wednesday 29th February 2012 the East Lancashire Hospital Trusts Heart Failure Nursing Team under the direction of Angela Graves and the Blackburn with Darwen Health Teams under the direction of Mark Campbell to have a day of fun filled education with the children of the Infants and Juniors of The Queen Elizabeth Grammar School in Blackburn. We will be educating the children about the Heart and its function, exercise and it’s impact on the heart and the importance of healthy food.

Not only will the children be actively involved all day they will also have some homework pre the event which will include the infants trying to name 10 correct fruit and vegeatable which they will learn before their fun filled day and the juniors answering a questionnaire on how much they know about the heart and the affects of nutrition and exercise. Whilst answering the questions both the infants and juniors will gather sponsorships which will be based on how many they can get correct by the 29th February 2012.

Collections on the day will go to the “Heart of Blackburn” 3D scanner appeal. Monies collected through the sponsorship forms will go to your local Heart Failure Chairty Pumping Marvellous.

One of our corporate sponsors Soulmatefood will also be offering a “pulled out the hat” prize for one of the parents for a full juice detox worth £200 – nothing like influencing upwards.

The event will be covered by the BBC and the Lancashire Evening Telegraph so we hope people will read and listen to the childrens achievements. We are quite happy to do this sort of event at your school so why don’t you contact us to discuss your requirements. Currently only available in the Lancashire area.

Tips on boosting your immune system

Healthy food for your Immune System

Let’s face it — some people have better immunity than others or do they and if they do how do they achieve it?

It is very important to keep in mind that it’s normal to get a cold or flu in cold and flu season, even if you do everything right to boost your immunity.

Wouldn’t it be nice if, instead of catching every virus, you were one of those who avoided most of them? Interestingly, there are factors that may cause some people to have better immunity than others. Here are some tips for a more “immune healthy lifestyle”

• Get your sleep – 8 hours is optimal
• Keep your hands clean – use bactericide soap - a lot of cold and flu virus are transmitted by door handles or even lift buttons to name a few
• Eat healthy foods including lots of fruit, vegeatables, wholgrains and lean protein – also it maybe a good idea to top up with a multi vitamin
• Regular exercise, doesn’t need to be a lot but just regular every week
• Manage your stress and deal with situations if you can, if not your Carer will help you
• Be a sociable person and have a positive outlook. People who tend to be gregarious tend to be able to keep their colds at bay

Remember you must always consult your Doctor or Heart Failure Nurse if you are going to take on board new nutritional and exercise based regimes.

Numerous studies have found that walking offers tremendous cardiac benefits. It helps people improve their fitness levels and endurance capacity, and it burns calories to aid in weight loss. Walking can lower your blood pressure, improve your cholesterol levels and your body’s ability to handle glucose or sugar, and reduce your risk of diabetes.

Aim to do 30 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise at least five days a week, or 20 minutes of vigorous activity three times a week. Moderate-intensity exercise is seen as the equivalent of a brisk walk, as if you have someplace to go, while vigorous exercise is even faster walking. If you’re starting an exercise program, just avoid doing vigorous activity until you’ve been exercising for a few months. The same goes for people with existing heart problems: Unless you have your doctor’s  or nurses okay, stick with moderate-intensity regimes.

If 30 minutes sounds too daunting at first, you can get the same benefits by doing three 10-minute bouts each day. For instance, maybe you walk your dog for 10 minutes in the morning, take a 10-minute stroll at lunch, and walk for another 10 minutes after dinner.

Strength Training for Heart Health

Strength training will not replace aerobic exercise but compliments and  boosts muscular strength and endurance; helps your body handle blood sugars; reduces blood pressure; and increases lean body mass, which can help prevent weight gain. Because you’re losing lean body mass, which burns more calories than fat, you gain weight. However, when you do strength training, you maintain lean body mass and prevent weight gain.

Do strength training for your entire body twice a week, completing one set of eight to 12 repetitions for each muscle group. As you progress, increase to two or three sets. If you’re not sure where to start, work with a certified personal trainer for one or two sessions,  or buy an instructional DVD or book. If the Gym is a local council run gym they are certified to help you make decisions, even better apply to join a Healthy Lifetsyle Team monitored event.

Pair your strength training and aerobic activities with a heart-friendly diet and you’ll be well on your way to building a stronger, healthier heart.

Always consult your Doctor or Heart Failure Nurse if you are doing strength training and if you have been sedentary for awhile, check with your Doctor or Heart Failure Nurse before starting any exercise regime.

Whether you’re looking to lose weight or maintain your current size, it all comes down to calories. Calories in must equal calories out to keep your weight steady;

1. Measure Portions to Prevent Overeating
2. Count Every Snack
3. Limit Nibbling on Food While You Cook
4. Put It on a Plate – Put all your food on a plate, make sure the plate size is the same all the time. Don’t eat out of bags etc
5. Choose Filling Foods – Lean proteins like fish and chicken as well as wholegrains are very good
6. Don’t Put Extra Food on the Table – Make sure you use the put it on a plate method
7. Cut Your Meal in Half – Dining out prodcues huge portions – take a doggie bag home with you
8. Slow Down and Enjoy – Concentrate on healthy eating by taking small bites, chewing thoroughly, and enjoying your food
9. Don’t Forget to Drink Water
10. Listen to Your Body – Don’t use food as a way of managing issues or opening a bag of crisps because you are watching TV or popcorn when watching a DVD
11. Cue Your Taste Buds: The Meal Is Over – Many of us don’t feel a meal is complete without dessert. Try retraining your taste buds. Healthy eating means knowing when to stop.
12. Do Your Homework  – Do you know what a portion looks like – click here
13. Don’t give up – stay focussed and your body and attitude will train themselves

Lancashire Patient Heart Failure Christmas Conference 2011

Heart Failure Conference Speakers

Just like to say a big thank you for all the fine work you did with your presentations. I was ever so pleased that we managed to get two great tangible outcomes apart from the great education opportunities all the patients and carers received.

The outcomes were as follows -

Shakil from Carers Contact has engaged with carers on the day and will create a Heart Failure Carer support group just for Carers. This is excellent however we realise without referrals this won’t work and therefore I ask everybody once we hear back from Shakil on the next steps that we support both Shakil and the carers as from what I saw there is definitely a real need – brilliant outcome and you can rely on Pumping Marvellous support.

I thought David and Jason from Northern Dragons  had a tricky job to engage with the patients and their carers however yet again the approach was brilliant and the outcome was full of engagement and when I get home I had two emails from patients on the day wanting to start the Pumping Marvellous Tai Chi Group with Northern Dragons with their carers as well; as stated Pumping Marvellous will pay half of the initial subscription for the first 4 paid lessons. Normal price is £5 therefore we will contribute £2.50 to a total of £10 per patient to get them going with their first 4 lessons which equates to £10 per patient or carer as I think we need to open this up to carers as well.

Eg – 10 patients and carers start, PM will sponsor these 10 people through the programme with a donation of £100 which will cover 50% of the total cost for the first 4 weeks. This should get them going!!! After taking the lead from Dr Joanne Sanderson surrounding the mental processing of weighing up the cost benefit analysis this will probably work to demonstrate to the patients and carers that there is a good health benefit and it is fun,  remind me after my sessions!! only kidding David and Jason.

A big thanks to Dr Joanne Sanderson for travelling from the Cardiac Centre at Blackpool to raise some big awareness issues surrounding the psychological elements of first hearing that you have heart failure and then the management of it going forward. I think we all listened with vigour so thanks very much for the help with this very specialised subject.

Thanks to Mike from CLAHRC in Manchester and we all hope you got the feedback you were looking for with our “Traffic Light” programme and we hope you will go back and communicate the hard work we are all doing and the innovation we are all showing.

Thanks to Beverly from the Cardiac and Stroke Network of Lancashire and Cumbria for showing support and hopefully we can help you going forward where you need patient input etc etc

I think some of us have found a new conference venue so thanks to Victoria at Ozzy Mills Business and Conference Centre for a flawless performance. Thanks for the twitter work as well you kept my thumbs busy on my iphone.

Let me not forget the kitchen at Soulmatefood, follow them on twitter if you want @Soulmatefood or @Soulmatechef – these are our corporate sponsors who make the most healthy and delicious food  and excellent sugar free mince pies, people were asking where they could buy them?? looks like you should start a mince pie company guys! there were only 10 left! shame really!!

At last but not least Angela Graves Clinical Lead for the Heart Failure Team at the ELHT and Beth Baron, Cardiac Practioner at Burnleys Healthy Lifetsyle team – I don’t need to say anything really as you “know me so well”

Image via Wikipedia

Good idea and we hope it succeeds

We found this post and we instantly thought it was a good idea, simple but obvious. It is the first step on the education ladder to creating expert patients and expert carers.

Arnot Health is offering a series of monthly educational classes for adults with or those who know or care for someone with congestive heart failure. The classes are scheduled from 6 to 7 p.m. beginning Oct. 27 in the Petrie East Conference Room at Arnot Ogden Medical Center in Elmira New York State.

Participants will be served a different soup and salad using low-sodium recipes. Recipe books and coupons will be provided.

The following topics will be presented in the series:

» Oct. 27 — What is heart failure?

» Nov. 17 — Managing heart failure with other chronic conditions

» Dec. 15 — Helping to manage your disease with diet

» Jan. 19 — Emotional aspects of the chronic condition

» Feb. 23 — Heart failure medications

» March 22 — Exercising to promote a healthy heart

Meet the Fantastic Five – Lancashire Heart Heroes- http://t.co/dzqWfLt1 - This is a newsletter that we send out to our dedicated followers of Pumping Marvellous. This particular newsletter focusses on the individual skills of the Fantastic Five, East Lancashire’ very own Heart Heroes.

We have just had our roller banner completed by our printers. Hopefully the message comes across loud and clear!

Health Heart Apple Campaign

When set with a challenge to help and support children aged between 3&4 at Rosegrove Nursery for their healthy lifestyle education week we jumped at the chance. Wow what a week! On Monday the children were set a challenge to memorise 10 pieces of fruit and vegetables for their sponsorship of Pumping Marvellous. Throughout the week they were tasked with their families to remember all 10 fruit and vegetables and on Friday they would be tested on how many they’d remember and what a great job they did. Rosegrove Primary School raised £816.04. Pumping Marvellous will then make a donation of £408 to the Blackburn 3D echo scanner appeal “The Heart of Blackburn Appeal”. So the children have not only raised money to help local Heart Failure patients but have also made a significant contribution to the appeal for the Royal Blackburn Hospital 3D scanner.

We know it is very important to create legacy when completing these types of exercises so we decided to utilise the skills of Laura at the Burnley Healthy Lifestyle Team. Laura completed a smoothie morning with all of the children in a try and taste nurturing style which we know they all enjoyed. This has led the nursery to continue this with the children. What a fantastic result considering all the bad press lately surrounding the obesity levels of children within the East Lancashire area. Unfortunately the Buffalo Project which we completed this exercise under was funded by the lottery and didn’t get its funding to continue. A very large disappointment for all and this will only affect children.