We all want to do right by our patients. I got into family medicine so that I could use a wide range of skills to help people to feel better.
I started thinking about this philosophically: how can I best use my skills to help the most people? How can I provide the most benefit to my community? To the healthcare system? To humanity?!
Part of the answer is that if I want to help the most people over the course of my healthcare career, it's vital that I take care of myself. As healthcare providers, we need to don our oxygen masks before helping others with theirs.
If you’re new to my blog – welcome! I’m a physiotherapist-turned-physician and new mom, and I want to help healthcare providers take care of their own health. This blog is especially for you if you tend to put patients first, or family first, or essentially anything else before your own wellbeing, but you’re looking to make a change.
My blog is focussed on high-value healthy habits, and how to implement them as busy healthcare providers. So, in this post, I want to share the habits that I focus on for my health.
These habits are my top priority when I’m trying to make healthier decisions. There are of course other healthy habits that didn’t make it into this post. But, in my opinion, these six habits are the lowest hanging fruit and highest-value targets for getting and staying healthy:
1. Boost your physically activity
Everyone knows the importance of physical activity, but I put this habit first because it’s one of the best things you can do for your mental and physical health. Exercise wards off chronic disease, helps sleep, boosts mood, and feels good to have done (and often feels good to do as well!) It’s also an objective way to see yourself treating your body well.
The best exercise to do is the one you can stick with. Second-best, if I had to choose, is a tie between strength training and walking.
Like everyone, I have limited time and energy as a mom and physician, so this is my current exercise routine at the time of writing this post. I’m far from perfect. In fact, I don’t hit Canada’s physical activity guidelines most weeks. But something is always better than nothing for physical activity.
2. Stop smoking and cut back on drugs and alcohol
I’m grateful that I never tried tobacco as a teen, even though it was offered many times. If you smoke and are reading this blog, you probably know the benefits of quitting. It’s possible to quit, we have more and more resources to help people do so, and quitting is likely the single best thing you can do for your health and wellbeing. I’ll get off my high horse now.
In terms of recreational drugs and alcohol, there are no safe amounts of either. That said, abstinence from both in our society is challenging. If you regularly use substances, including alcohol, write down how much you have in a week. If that number surprises you or makes you feel some type of way, slowly try to cut back until you’re comfortable with the number you see.
What helped me to cut back was to calculate how much money I was actually spending on alcohol. It wasn’t an amount I was comfortable with given my current amount of med school debt. So now I enjoy precisely 1-2 beers per week, and I’m very picky about when and where I’ll drink them. I’ll add this topic to the list of posts I’ll do in the future.
If you suspect you have a problem with using drugs/alcohol, please seek help. You deserve to feel well.
3. See your primary care provider
I can’t even count the number of times I didn’t make an appointment or rescheduled one with my own family doctor because I felt med school or work or my son took precedence. I had GERD that kept me awake at night for months in pregnancy and beyond before I finally made an appointment for it. An hour out of my day to see my family doctor saved me a great deal of pain and discomfort. And I’m embarrassed to admit that this was just a few months ago.
Please see your primary care provider when you need to. Get your routine screening tests done. Get vaccinated. Do for yourself what you’d recommend to your patients.
4. Socialize
I’m getting to the point where I believe more and more that happiness is closely tied to social connection. While there are a few people who don’t need or want to socialize, the rest of us benefit greatly from fostering healthy relationships.
Pick some people you want to spend time with, and then make a point of doing so on a regular basis.
5. Prioritize sleep
Getting enough good quality sleep will make your life better. Rest is a basic human need, one that many people don’t have access to right now. If you can, prioritize sleep. You need 7-9 hours per night. Yes, you.
I started to prioritize sleep in medical school. As a student re-starting school at 30, I wanted to retain what I was learning and have more energy in the day. I did two simple (and inexpensive) things to improve my sleep: I stuck to the same bedtime and wake up time every day that I wasn’t on call or working an overnight shift, and I started wearing ear plugs and a sleep mask. These two changes made a world of difference. My mood was better, my concentration improved, and I had the energy to workout even after a long day on my surgery rotations. I felt like I unlocked my superpower.
6. Maintain a healthy waist circumference
While there are many issues with BMI that I won’t get into here, waist circumference is a good measure of how much adiposity (fatty tissue) someone has around their middle. A high waist circumference is an independent risk factor for death from any cause, as well as cardiovascular disease.
For males, a healthy waist circumference is less than 37 inches. For females, it’s less than 31.5 inches. This resource from the Heart and Stroke Foundation details how to accurately measure your waist circumference. In essence, measure around your waist at the level of the top of your hip bones when you’re standing relaxed and after exhaling.
Waist circumference is an easy way to approximate body composition, which is how much muscle, other lean tissues, fat, and bone are in the body. When it comes to body composition, having more muscle and less fat is paramount for longevity.
People often focus on fat loss, but building muscle is awesome. I’m currently trying to build muscle by increasing my weight training, getting enough protein, and eating a bit more than normal. I love getting stronger and seeing more definition in my muscles.
There you have it. The six tips where I focus my time and energy for my health. If you feel so inclined, choose one and please let me know how it goes!
Stay well friends,
Dr. Kuhnow
This post is meant for educational purposes only, and doesn’t replace advice from your qualified healthcare professional.
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