November 7, 2024 • 47 mins
Ask Nigel Rawlins a question or send feedback, click the link to text me.
In this episode of the Wisepreneurs Podcast, host Nigel Rawlins sits down with Krisna Hanks, a metabolic health expert, to discuss how prolonged sitting can undermine even the healthiest habits. With decades of experience and her role as Director of Employee Wellness Programs at Ovadia Heart Health, Krisna highlights the importance of small, frequent “metabolic sparks” to boost resilience and mental clarity. She introduces the concept of the “active couch potato”—people who work out yet still sit for long hours—and offers actionable tips to help professionals over 50 maintain physical and cognitive vitality.
Key Themes
- The Impact of Sedentary Behavior: Effects on metabolic markers, cognitive function, and overall health.
- Metabolic Health Essentials: Importance of core metabolic markers like blood pressure, glucose, and triglycerides.
- ‘Metabolic Sparks’ for Everyday Life: Short activity breaks can boost energy and mental clarity.
- Employee Wellness in the Workplace: Moving beyond disease management to proactive wellness.
- Aging with Independence: Ways to maintain physical and cognitive resilience as we age.
Mentions
- Individuals: Dr Philip Ovadia, Dr Neville Owen, Dr Georgia Ede, Dr Christopher Palmer
- Organizations: Ovadia Heart Health, Stanford Health Promotion Network, Pennington Biomedical Research Center
Offers
Ovadia Heart Health's—free whitepaper on the impacts of sedentary behaviour can be downloaded at ovadiahearthealth.com/wellness.
Get in touch with Krisna
LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/krisnahanks/
Director Employee Wellness Ovadia Heart Health
https://ovadiahearthealth.com/
Square1wellness
https://www.square1wellness.com/
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Nigel Rawlins (00:00):
I'm delighted to welcome back, Krisna Hanks, a
(00:02):
lifelong advocate for movementand metabolic health.
With a remarkable career thatspans decades in dance, fitness
and wellness.
Krisna demonstrates that truehealth goes beyond regular
workouts or balanced nutrition.
It's about metabolic health andhow we move throughout each day.
At 67 Krisna taken on a dynamicnew role as the director of
(00:25):
Employee Wellness Programs atAvadia Heart Health.
She collaborates with forwardthinking companies that invests
in their employees wellbeing.
In addition to these programs,she coaches private clients
through Square One Wellness, thewellness practice she runs with
her husband.
Through her work.
Krisna helps the clients agewith vitality and mental
(00:46):
clarity.
In our conversation today, we'lldiscuss why even the best health
habits can fall short, if wespend too much time sitting and
how small frequent movements areessential to staying resilient.
independent and sharp as we age.
Krishna, welcome back to theWisepreneurs Podcast.
You were my guest on episode 13,so thank you for joining me
(01:08):
again.
Krisna Hanks (01:09):
How wonderful! Lucky 13, and here we are so
many episodes later.
Thank you for the opportunity,Nigel.
Nigel Rawlins (01:18):
I'm very interested in your new work that
you've been involved with.
So, but first Krisna, can youtell us something about yourself
and where you're from, and thenwe'll get into what you're doing
new.
Krisna Hanks (01:29):
Absolutely.
So, currently, I'm living inTucson, Arizona, in the desert.
However, I've lived in manydifferent places, as you might
be able to detect by that sortof eclectic accent that I have.
Part of that comes from the twodecades I spent living and
(01:49):
working in the Netherlands, inAmsterdam in particular.
My background, the short versionis, grew up in the Midwest, in
the state of Illinois, Quincy tobe exact.
Uh, as a young person did a lotof, uh, Gymnastics,
cheerleading, uh, there weren'ta lot of sports back then in my
day, um, became very involved ata young age in dance, and in
(02:13):
fact joined my firstprofessional dance company at
the age of 15.
That career landed me all theway to age 43, took me to a lot
of different places, Chicago,New York City, ended up in the
Netherlands for the latter partof my career and absolutely
loved it, uh, towards the end ofthat career and throughout my
(02:37):
whole career, I've beenfascinated by the moving body.
I taught dance, obviously as adancer, choreographed, I also
taught personal fitness,Pilates, senior fitness,
everything moving, pretty muchall through that time, um, as
well as towards the end.
And then.
(02:58):
Became an executive coach, didsome years of executive
coaching, and then just seeing alot of the struggles that
individuals have became muchmore focused on health coaching.
And I know that can be kind of ageneric, broad term.
I see now where I am as more ofa Metabolic Health Coach really
(03:20):
focusing in on the benefits ofgood metabolic health,
particularly as I age andeveryone around us is aging.
Um, it's not something we canget around and, um, have, uh,
done various things throughoutthat, that, that time on the
Pilates studio with my husband.
(03:41):
Have our own coaching business,Square One Wellness Coaching.
But right now, currently.
I'm working for heart surgeon,Dr.
Philip Ovadia, who has OvadiaHeart Health.
He's written a fabulous book.
I recommend to a lot of people'Stay Off My Operating Table'
which is something we'd all liketo do, not be on the heart
(04:04):
surgeon's operating table.
As their Director of EmployeeWellness Programs, I also do
metabolic coaching for them, buttrying to really focus now in on
the work site, employeewellness, uh, employee metabolic
health.
Nigel Rawlins (04:21):
in many ways, you've got a new job.
And what's interesting aboutthis new job, you're about my
age, you've started a new careerin your late 60s.
Krisna Hanks (04:33):
Isn't that fun?
Isn't that fun?
Yes.
I definitely subscribe to theidea of maintaining work at some
point.
Maybe there'll come a time whereI say, okay, I'm done.
Um, I just want to go retire,but I feel I have a passion.
(04:54):
I love what I do.
I love working with the Ovadiateam.
Um, I love.
Partnering with my, my husband,Robert on various projects as
well.
And it just feels right tocontinue working and maybe there
will come a day, well, when I'llsay no, but like yourself, um,
(05:14):
I'm still energized by what Ido.
And I still would love tocontribute.
I'm still
Nigel Rawlins (05:19):
trying to work out what it is that I'm doing,
but I do think, I do thinkyou're right about the movement.
That we are born to move, andour whole world revolves around
moving and if anyone was to see,now we are audio only, but if
you see a picture of Krisna,she's lean and she's incredibly
fit and she looks very veryyoung.
(05:39):
You do not look your age at all.
Krisna Hanks (05:42):
Well, thank you very much.
I am.
Yeah.
And moving has definitely alwaysbeen something I felt I've had
an affinity.
My mother would always say sheasked me around the age of
three, what I wanted to be inalready, then I said, I wanted
to be a dancer.
Yeah.
So maybe there's somethinginherent in it, but thank you
(06:04):
very much for the compliment.
Nigel Rawlins (06:06):
Now I think people will see for themselves
and it's something to aim for.
So let's start talk a little bitabout why I contacted you this
time.
Ovadia Heart Health put out awhite paper.
So let's talk a little bit aboutwhat the subject of that is.
So can you tell me somethingabout that?
Because I'm assuming you wereinvolved in that white paper as
well.
Krisna Hanks (06:24):
Yes, I, I penned that paper with the oversight
of, uh, of Dr.
Ovedia, uh, and our medicalteam.
Actually, we have a nursepractitioner and other
clinicians, uh, on the team.
So this white paper is about thedetrimental effects of sedentary
(06:44):
behavior, particularly with alittle emphasis on the
workplace.
That said, I'm going to caveatthat.
Many people who work from home,many people who are even just
retired or partially working,are spending a lot of hours
sitting.
(07:05):
So while the emphasis may beslightly towards those, uh,
still in the workplace.
The workplace is everywhere, itmight be your kitchen table, it
might be an office you've madein your house.
You might be in an office.
I just do a little back historyon why this topic became very
(07:26):
interesting to me, but alsoclose by.
So in 2010, uh, we were livingin the San Francisco Bay Area.
And I was at that time, themembership director of a group
called the Stanford HealthPromotion Network, SHPN.
(07:47):
And this is out of StanfordUniversity.
It was a consortium of companieswithin that San Francisco,
primarily Silicon Valley area,uh, wanting to incorporate more
employee wellness programs intotheir companies.
So we had the likes of Google,Facebook, okay, all the big tech
(08:09):
companies, but also many othersmaller nonprofits from the
various locations.
All interested in how can weimprove the health of our
employees and anyone associatedwith us.
So Stanford organized in 2010,the first conference on what
(08:30):
they called then the science ofsedentary behavior.
This was a little bit of akickoff.
They were, um, unveiling kind ofa new department, a new thing
called the Center for Longevity.
So this was one of their firstprojects.
And I was invited as a worksitewellness consultant, along with
(08:52):
many researchers.
It was not a conference open tothe public, but just by people
connected and working activelyin that field.
But one of the most interestingthings about this conference was
you could not present with aPowerPoint.
They allowed no PowerPoints.
They had no presentation.
(09:12):
You were just asked to talkabout what you were doing.
Um, that way to have interactionwith each other.
I thought that was just amazing.
Absolutely fascinating.
But in this conference, therewas some particular work and I
have right here and we can putthis in the show notes.
One of the first individuals tospeak is actually from your
(09:35):
country, Dr.
Neville Owen and GenevieveHealy.
Their paper, I thought, was thespark for pretty much everyone
there.
It's titled, Too Much Sitting,The Population Health Science of
Sedentary Behavior.
And just to make this a littlemore realistic, what was
(09:56):
completely fascinating to me assomeone who spent my life in the
moving fields, I have twodegrees in kinesiology, is that
their research was pointingtowards too much sitting is not
the same as too little exercise.
And it was this whole sort ofdiving deeper into the fact that
(10:21):
actually metabolic markers wereimpacted by what they called
prolonged hours of sitting.
They even came up with thesetwo, two terms called a
prolonger.
That would be someone who had,you know, multiple hours of
sitting back to back as opposedto a breaker.
(10:43):
Someone in even they gaveexamples of someone who's kind
of fidgety, right?
I just moving around and wouldeven like sit up and stand up.
Those could be considered breaksand that this moved away from
what had been much of ourthinking of all you have to do
is do your you know with thethis various groups recommend
(11:06):
150 minutes a week of exercise,two times a week of strength
training and all these thingsand you'll be fine.
And they even came up with afunny term, which I use a lot in
when I'm speaking, the activecouch potato.
Meaning you can do everythingcorrectly.
You can hit all the markers.
You're doing your strengthtraining.
(11:27):
You're doing cardiovasculartraining.
You're doing stretching.
But if you're sitting formultiple hours, some of this
good work that you're doing foryourself is negated.
And I just thought that wasfascinating.
It kind of blew, blew my mindfor lack of a better way to say
(11:48):
it, to say, okay, we have torethink how we are approaching
our daily lives.
Nigel Rawlins (11:57):
Now, and that's interesting because that's quite
a while back and now it'sstarting to emerge and it does
It seems to be the case that,um, you know, people realize
things and there are theoriesand studies, but it can take
many years before it comes intothe mainstream.
For example, metabolic health.
Um, we've probably known aboutthat for many, many years.
So let's talk a little bit aboutabout what sedentary behavior is
(12:22):
and what problems is it causing.
So sitting down's one.
I guess the other one is sittingin bed watching TV at night,
sitting and watching TV.
Krisna Hanks (12:33):
Correct.
And I just kind of want to makesure I hit these numbers
correct.
So, When we think aboutactivity, and we point this out
in our white paper, there's aclassification that's called a
MET, M E T, a MetabolicEquivalent of Task.
(12:53):
And this early reason is It istrue, right?
We're talking 2010.
Here we are 2024.
Takes things a long time, right?
To, to change.
So a metabolic equivalent oftask, something like sitting or
long term stationary is down inthat one, I think to 1.
(13:19):
5.
And, they utilize not only justNeville Owen, Genevieve Healy,
but there's interestingresearch, Mark Hamilton who
worked at Pennington BiomedicalResearch Center.
They use this term called lightintensity exercise, which can be
just standing up, starting towalk, lifting your legs up,
(13:41):
things that use, um, sort ofrather larger group muscles like
our quadriceps, the front of thethigh, gluteus muscles, the seat
muscles, postural muscles.
And this went to a level stayingunder around a three MET.
And if you think otheractivities, so above the three
would be what we would classifya little more as moderate
(14:04):
intensity exercise.
And then we start going in thisrange from three MET to eight
MET.
Those would be things likebiking, swimming, walking with a
little more vigorousness,running.
Um, and then obviously, veryvigorous would be really kind of
high intensity.
So the MET qualifies it.
(14:26):
Uh, and this is something thenthat can be measured through
accelerometers and other tools.
Um, and it's not like it's aperfect measurement.
Somebody says, well, how do Iknow if I'm doing light or
moderate?
And we will even use thingslike, well, light's just
(14:47):
basically kind of changing yourbody position in, in many ways.
Moderate is more of a consistentactivity, but yet you're not
really raising that heart ratesuper high.
You could still carry on a niceconversation, you and I could
talk easily.
When we get into the vigorous,that's when it might be harder
to carry on a conversation and,uh, you need more focus, The old
(15:11):
talk test, your breath and your,your talking are changing.
Nigel Rawlins (15:15):
So basically, I'm assuming what I'm hearing is
that if you keep your MET levelaround one most of the day, you
are really a couch potato andit's going to create problems
for your health.
So you need to vary it.
Krisna Hanks (15:29):
Yes, you need to vary it and we'll talk about
ways to do that, but I want toread one clip from, or one
little phrase to show that exactsort of definition of
physiologically what is changingand why this research also just
totally ties into wanting to beand help individuals improve
(15:53):
their metabolic health.
So this comes again from thatpaper from Neville Owen and all
and, um, physiologically, It'sbeen suggested that the loss of
local contractile stimulationinduced through sitting leads to
(16:13):
both the suppression of skeletalmuscle lipoprotein lipase,
something called LPL activity,and this is necessary for the
for triglyceride uptake and HDL,which is high density
lipoprotein cholesterolproduction and reduced glucose
(16:34):
uptake.
And that's, a bunch of sort offancy scientific words, but what
we're talking about is acompromise on our metabolic
system in a nutshell.
And we have five markers ofmetabolic health.
We have waist circumference,blood pressure, blood glucose,
(16:57):
which we just mentioned,triglycerides, which we just
mentioned and HDL, which we justmentioned.
So, we have our metabolic healthprimary markers being influenced
when we're sitting for back toback hours, right?
Now, I will caveat a lot of thisresearch.
(17:18):
At first, it was monitoredthrough individuals, you know,
sort of self recording theirhours, and then they moved on to
more sophisticated, where, wherethey could actually track them
with accelerometers, so itwasn't their own reporting.
And actually, then what we sawwas they were sitting even more.
So, it has a real direct
Nigel Rawlins (17:38):
Yeah, That's one of the issues I think that we're
seeing with a lot of studies isself reporting is not accurate
at all.
It's almost made up.
So you talked about the fivemetabolic health markers there.
So sedentary behavior isactually causing trouble with
all of those.
So let's have a little talkabout what's the benefit of
(17:59):
metabolic health.
And because one of the issueshere is, you and I, because
we're older, and hopefully myaudience is listening, is, is
trying to look at ways they cankeep their metabolic health
going into their 80s and, andolder, and often, like yourself
and myself, to keep working.
But not to age cognitively, sowe can still think, we can still
(18:22):
reflect on things, and still doour jobs, you know, and think.
So, what are the benefits ofmetabolic health, that you were
talking about?
Krisna Hanks (18:32):
Excellent question.
And think that the knowledgebase just exploded and expanded
on metabolic health.
And a lot of it really justsprung up like a rocket ship
also during COVID because we sawthat individuals who had poor
metabolic health, who hadunderlying chronic conditions,
(18:52):
were at a greater risk for, uh,catching the virus.
So that catapulted a lot to themainstream, but we've known for
years individuals who have poormetabolic health and
particularly individuals whomight be more, what we would
call insulin resistant asopposed to insulin sensitive,
(19:14):
um, also at a greater risk fortype two diabetes, for heart
health, for many of theautoimmune diseases, a host of
chronic conditions, and thereare a lot of not only heart
surgeons, I'm working with anamazing heart surgeon, but all
kinds of other doctors invarious realms looking at trying
(19:38):
to help their patients improvemetabolic health in order to
prevent some of these diseases,which we now kind of, sadly, are
saying anybody who ages is goingto automatically get ill.
One of the phrases I like toutilize is don't accept that
just because you age, you needor are automatically become,
(20:01):
become ill.
And one of those preventivemeasures is to look at your
metabolic health markers, try toimprove all the other lifestyle
factors, not only that influencemetabolic health, but just allow
you to have a little morecontrol over your health.
We know sleep, managing, havinggood sleep hygiene, managing
(20:23):
your stress, having good stressmanagement practice, getting
regular exercise and nutritionthat does not contribute to this
picture of insulin resistance orinsulin sensitivity, meaning
that you're really managingwell, your blood glucose
(20:44):
management, which then meansyou're managing your insulin.
Oh, it's all definitely tiesinto that.
And inflammation, you know, is abig word that gets used a lot,
but improving your metabolichealth is meaning that you're
also lowering a lot of thosemarkers that could be
contributing to inflammation inthe
Nigel Rawlins (21:05):
Now, What's interesting about this is we're
becoming better educated aboutmetabolic health and looking
after ourselves, but the bigissue is to actually do it, put
it into practice.
And you're also talking aboutthere is measuring it.
And I would suggest that thatmeans working closely with your
doctor.
What did I hear about, I don'tknow if it was on of your
(21:27):
newsletters, was it?
I think, um, somebody was on 15medications.
Was that your newsletter that Iread then?
Krisna Hanks (21:36):
It was, it was a, it was a, uh, a blog post.
Yes.
Yes.
Yes,
Nigel Rawlins (21:40):
and that was a young per well, young to us.
Well,
Krisna Hanks (21:44):
to us, young to us, and that sadly has been
accepted that is, it is okay.
Um, I do want to touch on onepoint that you brought up and I
just want to make sure we don'tmiss it.
You talked about cognition as weage and metabolic health is even
(22:05):
being tied into that.
Good metabolic health.
Now we even have a term,metabolic psychiatry, which is a
rapidly growing field, where wehave clinical psychiatrists, two
of the very most prominent inthat field are Dr.
Christopher Palmer from HarvardUniversity.
(22:25):
His book is called Brain Energy.
Dr.
Georgia Ede, her book is, ChangeYour Diet, Change your mind, I
believe.
Sorry if I didn't say correctly,but it's a fabulous book.
She's also a clinicalpsychiatrist, used to be at
Harvard.
She's now, uh, I've been workingon her own.
Both tie good nutrition tobetter brain health.
(22:49):
Obviously, they use medicationsand pharmaceuticals in their
practice with their patients.
However, there are patients whopharmaceuticals don't work for,
and they show good promise.
They're, they're utilizing theketogenic diet to improve brain
health from various, disordersfrom attention deficit to
bipolar to depression.
(23:10):
Again, this is not saying aneither or, but that there are
options.
So we see also, this is a line,I believe, Dr.
Georgie Ede, you can't separatethe brain from the body.
They work together.
And this is a great philosophywhen we think about metabolic
health and good metabolic healthin our body.
(23:33):
It means good metabolic healthfor our brain.
Um, and this, I think for ourage group, Nigel, us young ones,
yeah, is important because whodoesn't want to live
independently, uh, and havetheir brain functioning on all
cylinders.
Nigel Rawlins (23:51):
The other big thing is, the older we are, as
long as we've been continuing tolearn and we've, we've developed
a solid body of knowledge, we'vestill got a big contribution to
make to, to help others.
Um, you know, our brains areobviously going to be different,
Different, say, younger person'sbrain, they've got a different
form of intelligence, they callit fluid intelligence.
(24:12):
Ours is a crystallizedintelligence.
But it's a matter of whether wecan keep recalling and keep
helping.
And that's what we've got toprotect when we're older.
That's why I love what you'retalking about.
So, alright, we've talked aboutthe health risks of sedentary
behavior.
How much sedentary behavior isout there?
Do you think?
Krisna Hanks (24:32):
That is a million dollar question, I would say.
And it's not only from theresearch that I've cited, and I
encourage everyone, and we canput some extra links in the show
notes to look at this workthemselves.
There are many more, in fact,many people are using this
saying that sitting is the newsmoking, right?
(24:53):
I don't like to go down the fearcampaign rabbit hole, but I, I
think what's important to knowis back to back hours are not
good for anybody.
So in some of the originalresearch they had shown,
particularly detrimental forpeople who were doing over four
hours in a row.
Okay.
(25:13):
Um, we now know most people arekind of aware that's not a good
number to be striving, but Ilike to say you know at a
minimum, you're doing some kindof body change position every
hour to not get yourself soabsorbed in that project you're
working on, uh, on yourcomputer.
For some people, they need toset a timer, for some people,
(25:35):
they have a thermos.
So they're drinking either somecoffee, some tea, some water,
which automatically makes themget up to use the restroom a
little bit more.
That's a good thing.
And what we saw again, goes backto this conversation on the MET
the metabolic equivalent task.
It can be just as simple as youstand up, walk around your chair
(25:57):
and you come back and sit.
I like to tell people do, do acertain number of air squats
every day when you're behindthat computer.
And it can be, you know, you cando even a little bit more if you
want to get up and feelenthusiastic, do a couple
jumping jacks or something likethat.
But think of it like metabolicsparks.
(26:19):
Like you, you changed yourposture, you changed your
position, you got yourself to alittle bit higher MET activity
level.
And this seems to stimulate yourmetabolic processes.
I've often used the analogy ofif you sit back to back hours,
it's almost as if your bodythought you went to sleep and it
(26:40):
doesn't need to really doanything.
And in fact, we do see peoplewho do too many back to back
hours have trouble sleeping.
That it can be a sleep disrupterif we haven't had enough of
these light intensity exercises.
And there, people have gottenway creative, some people in
(27:00):
call centers are using treadmilldesk and various things.
But even here now, I work a lotof hours from home.
I'm sitting now, but I have astanding position where I can
stand up to do coaching sessionsor other team calls.
It's the variety that matters.
And I think we need to thinkabout this also for people who
(27:22):
will binge watch on Netflix.
I mean, how many episodes in arow are you going to watch?
It's not just when you'reabsorbed in doing an Excel sheet
on something on your computer.
Nigel Rawlins (27:36):
Well, I was just thinking it's, if you're binge
watching Netflix, you'reprobably eating, um, foods.
That, that was the point I wasgoing to make.
I remember the good old dayswhen we only had TV.
When the ads came on, we all gotup to make a cup of tea or go to
the toilet or something likethat.
We moved.
Whereas nowadays with yourstreaming, and I only prefer to
(27:58):
watch streaming nowadays, so Idon't watch normal TV, um, yeah,
I have to force myself.
And I was just going to say overthe back there, that's an under
desk treadmill that I boughtrecently.
It's a only a couple hundreddollars.
And that's Australian dollarstoo, which American dollars
would be much, much cheaper.
American dollars is much, muchbetter than Australian dollars.
(28:19):
So about$240, you can have anunder desk and you only have to
move the desk up and just do it.
I use it for online learning ifI want to learn something.
I'll walk whilst I'm watchingsomething.
Um, so yeah, there's all sortsof ways.
But the other thing aboutsitting too long that I noticed,
your back bends.
So you're starting to changeyour posture as well and stiffen
(28:40):
up your body, especially aroundthe shoulders.
Krisna Hanks (28:42):
Yes, yes, there's all kinds of, uh, you know, uh,
postural issues that come out ofthose long hours because the
body becomes sort of passive,uh, we call it, you know, you
get yourself into that bananaposition, tension in the
shoulders and neck and, and themovement can actually stimulate
(29:03):
that, also, I know that, Nigel,you work with a lot of women.
And the results from theseAustralian studies, but also the
ongoing work in this field oflooking, at breaking up our
sitting time, actually the womenfared worse in these studies
(29:24):
than the men, and not to saythat men should go ahead and sit
for back to back hours, but thisis also one of the reasons I
sort of dove into this area alittle bit more is, it's
important to understand thatalso some of these issues we
have to pay more attention tothan the men do.
Nigel Rawlins (29:45):
That was my concern.
Well, I'm assuming that whenwomen get to a certain age, they
might actually retire.
And if they haven't gotsomething else to do, put it
this way, I was thinking about afamily member whose movement is,
is being reduced more and moreand is struggling to get out of
chairs and stuff like that.
And so when you can't move,you're restricted to a smaller
(30:08):
and smaller space.
And at some point it meansyou're in a home and, and that's
the biggest fear was, and, andwhen you're in a home, you're
being cared for, and I know whenmy mum moved into a home, she
didn't last much longer.
Krisna Hanks (30:21):
Right.
Right.
So that trajectory is a sad onethat is very known these days.
And I think something like thiswhere we can approach it from
all the fields.
That's why I find working inemployee wellness with the
Ovidia team so fascinating isone of the things that breaking
(30:42):
up sitting time is a reallyimportant piece that a lot of
people could participate in.
That's where they could start.
So let's say physical activity,they have some other
complications that are hinderingfrom that.
This is one area that they couldstart little baby steps to
improve in, uh, is the littlethings, maybe, you know, finding
(31:05):
some ways to move their legsunderneath their chair, to move
their arms, to practice in asmall way, getting up slightly
from your chair and gettingdown, even if they can't exactly
get up all the way.
Getting a sturdy chair that hasarms in it, where they can push
down themselves.
It is a piece that doesn'trequire all the strenuous
(31:29):
activity, but a really goodsolid piece to start with.
As well as trying to improvethose metabolic markers.
Nigel Rawlins (31:36):
I keep thinking about my mentor.
Unfortunately, he had a fall inold age and that finished him
off just about.
But before he passed away theywere trying to get him to do
squats so that you could sit andget out of the seat.
I mean, it's simple things likesquatting, you know, it's, it's
just scary how you can lose it.
(31:58):
All right, is this all ages thatthey need to start or is there
differences about what you cando?
Because I'm, again, if we, wethink about old, say, women,
what can they start doing ifthey've suddenly realised their
body has changed and that's whathappens, our bodies go a bit
south when we get a bit olderand we're sort of thinking, oh,
I really do need to do somethingabout this.
(32:20):
How can they start to get out ofthat active couch potato.
What, what should they be doing?
Krisna Hanks (32:25):
Well, if someone's actually an active couch potato,
they might be alreadyexercising, right?
That's kind of the definition ofit.
They're doing all the otherrecommended exercise, but
they're, they're sitting toomuch.
But I think the general questionis, what can people do?
Well, we know sort of littlekids, they don't stop moving.
(32:46):
They're pretty much going 24sevens.
We get into the teenage years,so I think.
This is something that maybeparents need to, to have a look
at is also how much time aretheir kids spending on their
devices and looking at ways tohelp break them up.
Um, there was a small study, nottoo long ago, it was only on 50
(33:07):
people that showed that even ifthey did one less hour of
actual, uh, phone time, theirdevices.
In their leisure hours, theywere, they showed some benefits
health wise.
Um, but I think any age is agood age to start looking at
(33:27):
this right now because we allhave a great portion of our
lives, uh, connected or tied totechnology.
And I think the big takeaway ofour conversation is here is yes,
do all the activity that youlove doing.
If you love dancing, if you lovePilates, if you love walking,
hiking, if you're strengthtraining, we talked about that
(33:50):
last time in episode 13.
I'm a big proponent of strengthtraining for anyone over the age
of 50, particularly, to keepyour muscle maintenance or, to
manage your muscles, and toensure also that you're, if you
do fall, you've got some goodstrong muscles to support you.
And, um, but I think whetheryou're in the 30s, 40s, 50s,
(34:16):
understanding that too muchsitting is It's not the same as
too little exercise because I, Ido see, and I work with many
young people, I do see youngpeople who do lots of wonderful
physical activity, but they willsit for hours behind their
laptop, texting, you know,Instagram, TikTok, watching
(34:38):
video after video.
I think it's important for them.
Obviously, We have more, let'ssay, to worry metabolically.
They, they have their youth tosort of help them carry them on
for a while, but at a certainpoint that youth won't be, um,
you know, carrying them as theygo through the various hormonal
(35:00):
changes.
Not only from this research, butjust in my own work, I think
anyone above the age of 50should take breaking up their
sitting time very seriously.
Nigel Rawlins (35:12):
The other thing in there too, with the strength
training, one of the problemsabout being older is that we
don't even use the proteinproperly.
That younger people can, becausethey can eat some protein and
their body uses it.
Whereas when we're older, weneed so much more for it to
actually, be used.
Krisna Hanks (35:30):
Very good point.
Sadly, as we age, we're not asefficient as processing that
protein and like getting yourprotein.
That's one of the things we workon with the Ovidia team and also
my husband and I and our processis really helping people get to
get a good protein target.
We use the words prioritizeprotein, uh, at every meal.
(35:52):
It doesn't matter how manymeals, some people do two meal a
day.
Some people even work well withone meal a day, or even if
you're three meal a day, butreally making sure that your
protein target is spot on.
Nigel Rawlins (36:04):
It definitely helps with muscle.
I know at my age, I've beendoing strength training now for
five years, so I've actually gotsome muscle definition, but I
think all the strength trainingI'm doing at my age is just
maintaining what I've got.
I don't think it's able to growmuch more.
So, because I think thedeterioration as we get older is
quite significant.
(36:25):
So, um, you know, I'm fightingjust to keep up with keeping
what I've got.
But, if I hadn't have done fiveyears, I don't think I'd be as
well defined as I am, you couldsay that.
Um, I just noticed with youngerpeople, their skin's a lot more
elastic than ours and looks abit better.
Krisna Hanks (36:42):
But they, they have a little more help from the
growth hormone that we don'thave so much assistance from
that as we age, but you know, asI like to say, we've got two
levers.
In that muscle maintenance,category to pull you can pull
the protein one.
I'm a big proponent of animalfoods is a big source of protein
(37:04):
power because of the goodbioavailability of it.
You've got another lever andthat's your strength training.
You want to try to be makingsure as we age that you're
pulling both of those levers.
Nigel Rawlins (37:15):
So let's talk a little bit about how you help
companies.
So obviously that's, that'swhere the aim is now to get into
the companies where people havegot sedentary behavior.
So what does a, a program looklike if you're going into a
company to help them?
Krisna Hanks (37:31):
Great question.
So, I'll just utilize an exampleof working currently with a
manufacturing company.
Manufacturing company hasmultiple shifts.
They're actually working prettymuch 24 seven, but you have
three distinct shifts.
And our focus with Ovidia HeartHealth is metabolic health.
(37:55):
We have oversight, uniqueoversight with having a heart
surgeon looking over our contentand our problems.
Our major focus is having that,that interaction.
So we're on site.
We're going to the factory sixtimes in the year.
We do education, we doempowerment, we do some one on
(38:16):
one coaching for specificthings.
We help lay this foundation ofunderstanding what metabolic
health is.
It's understanding the lifestylepieces that contribute to good
metabolic health.
They do some initial lab work,those labs are then reviewed by
our medical team.
(38:36):
And then we do lab work at theend of the program so that they
can have a comparison to lookwhat doing some lifestyle
changes might offer them.
It's very much bringing this.
to them.
A lot of worksite wellness inthe past has been disease
management focused.
(38:57):
And I don't know if that term isutilized in your country or not,
but disease management basicallymeans we work with you only when
you're sick.
For example, in years past in aworksite wellness program, if
you wanted to participate in thenutrition program, you needed to
be diabetic.
You couldn't take the nutritionprogram unless you had some sort
(39:19):
of disease.
Our focus is to flip thataround, away from disease
management towards building afoundation for good metabolic
health.
Nigel Rawlins (39:32):
And long term health from the sound of it.
So that's a fairly enlightenedemployer to, to want to look
after their employees like that.
So, and that sounds like asignificant investment,
especially with blood tests.
Um, I'd say the interestingthing there is if you've never
had those blood tests before,and they give you some
indicators, it's a jolt to dosomething about it, but you're
(39:54):
there also to explain, well, youknow, here you are now, this is
where you've got to get to.
That that's very, verysupportive.
I'd say one of the issues too,where people are working three
shifts, that can really muck uptheir metabolism too, if you're
stuck on the night shift.
Krisna Hanks (40:10):
Yes, there are strategies we need to do to work
with individuals to help themboost their circadian rhythm.
Sleep hygiene in that way.
And that's why it's always thatwhole package, uh, of all these
pieces.
It's not just your lab results,but it's the work you have on
how can you improve some ofthese other factors where you
(40:30):
might have another barrier thatyou just you can't change.
Many of them love their jobs,but yeah, the, the cycle and the
time is more of a challenge.
And you're absolutely a hundredpercent right.
The employer is veryenlightened, the CEO.
Um, and this is what it's goingto take.
And in America, the employersare often covering the costs of
(40:52):
the healthcare.
And this is a differentapproach.
Can we improve our health care,and our health and wellbeing of
our employees, not wait untilthey get sick.
And this is a definite differentphilosophy.
Not every employer isenlightened like that.
Thank goodness there are some,and hopefully there are more
(41:15):
growing.
And, this is a chance to have alarger scope and broaden the
knowledge base of all kinds ofpeople about the benefits of
metabolic health.
Nigel Rawlins (41:29):
The last thing I want to do is end up in a
hospital from something that Icould have, um, prevented, you
know, over the years.
Uh, we're very lucky inAustralia, we do have public
health, so if we have anaccident, we're straight into
hospital and there is no cost.
Which is fantastic, where youhear some horror stories about
the costs of medical treatmentin America, and we can't
(41:50):
understand it in Australia, thatyou don't have a good public
health system.
Krisna Hanks (41:54):
And it's, it's very interesting also to think
about health, right?
You help a lot of entrepreneurs,Nigel.
You're, you're working withpeople, various levels.
Some are employed, some are selfemployed.
And when we think about ourhealth, right?
Back to the old thing, you can'tseparate the body from the
(42:15):
brain.
It's also about performance.
And we, not only as agingcreatures, right?
But if we're not well, and ifwe're not well metabolically,
it's hard to perform well.
And this is also somethingthat's been known in the
workforce.
You know, you want to, you doexecutive coaching, you want
(42:36):
your team to have high levelperformance skills and
communication and negotiationand sales and everything.
It's really hard to do any ofthose things, if your physical
body and your mental body aren'twell, and that's where I think
the exciting point and theexciting place to be in employee
wellness is that point rightthere.
(42:59):
What are we doing to improve andput the performance of ourselves
as the leadership team or CEO oranyone else, but also our
employees to take it to anotherlevel.
Nigel Rawlins (43:12):
Which is what the knowledge economy is all about.
Having a high level cognitiveability is definitely a
competitive advantage.
So anyone who's working in thatsort of area really does need to
keep their brain really on theball, and that means your body.
Is there anything else that
Krisna Hanks (43:33):
First I want to say thank you again for the
opportunity to talk with you.
I always love sharing ideas andI think I encourage everyone to
do their research in terms ofmetabolic health.
We spend a lot of time at workand those hours should also be
supporting our health choices.
(43:54):
To open up that conversationabout metabolic health.
But on our topic today, alsotalking about ways that you can
break up your sitting time.
Um, there's substantial researchout there to show that people
who take many breaks are higherperformers as opposed to those
(44:15):
people who, you know, in thisresearch, you classify them as
prolongers, those who sits forhours or breakers.
And we all know that if we'reworking on a project, we step
outside, get a little bit offresh air.
We come back.
Suddenly it seems to click forus to encourage others to
(44:36):
support these practices.
Nigel Rawlins (44:37):
Well that is brilliant.
Okay, there is the whitepaperthat can be downloaded, but how
would you like people to connectwith you, Krisna?
Krisna Hanks (44:45):
So absolutely.
Certainly the white paper can bedownloaded for free.
That's at the Ovadia HeartHealth.
com slash wellness page.
And we can put that in thelinks.
And in that paper, I also cite alot of the research we talked
about today.
My website with my husband,Robert is square one, the number
(45:08):
one wellness com.
I'm on LinkedIn just by my name.
I'm on Twitter at square onewellness and Instagram, the same
square one wellness.
So, I'm out there.
Nigel Rawlins (45:21):
You're definitely out there.
I see you on Twitter a lot.
Alright, thank you very much,Krisna, for joining me.
Krisna Hanks (45:27):
Thank you again.
It's an honor to be a repeatingcustomer here and keep doing the
fabulous work that you're doingfor all those women, but men as
well in the working space.
I'm delighted to welcome back, Krisna Hanks, a
(00:02):
lifelong advocate for movementand metabolic health.
With a remarkable career thatspans decades in dance, fitness
and wellness.
Krisna demonstrates that truehealth goes beyond regular
workouts or balanced nutrition.
It's about metabolic health andhow we move throughout each day.
At 67 Krisna taken on a dynamicnew role as the director of
(00:25):
Employee Wellness Programs atAvadia Heart Health.
She collaborates with forwardthinking companies that invests
in their employees wellbeing.
In addition to these programs,she coaches private clients
through Square One Wellness, thewellness practice she runs with
her husband.
Through her work.
Krisna helps the clients agewith vitality and mental
(00:46):
clarity.
In our conversation today, we'lldiscuss why even the best health
habits can fall short, if wespend too much time sitting and
how small frequent movements areessential to staying resilient.
independent and sharp as we age.
Krishna, welcome back to theWisepreneurs Podcast.
You were my guest on episode 13,so thank you for joining me
(01:08):
again.
Krisna Hanks (01:09):
How wonderful! Lucky 13, and here we are so
many episodes later.
Thank you for the opportunity,Nigel.
Nigel Rawlins (01:18):
I'm very interested in your new work that
you've been involved with.
So, but first Krisna, can youtell us something about yourself
and where you're from, and thenwe'll get into what you're doing
new.
Krisna Hanks (01:29):
Absolutely.
So, currently, I'm living inTucson, Arizona, in the desert.
However, I've lived in manydifferent places, as you might
be able to detect by that sortof eclectic accent that I have.
Part of that comes from the twodecades I spent living and
(01:49):
working in the Netherlands, inAmsterdam in particular.
My background, the short versionis, grew up in the Midwest, in
the state of Illinois, Quincy tobe exact.
Uh, as a young person did a lotof, uh, Gymnastics,
cheerleading, uh, there weren'ta lot of sports back then in my
day, um, became very involved ata young age in dance, and in
(02:13):
fact joined my firstprofessional dance company at
the age of 15.
That career landed me all theway to age 43, took me to a lot
of different places, Chicago,New York City, ended up in the
Netherlands for the latter partof my career and absolutely
loved it, uh, towards the end ofthat career and throughout my
(02:37):
whole career, I've beenfascinated by the moving body.
I taught dance, obviously as adancer, choreographed, I also
taught personal fitness,Pilates, senior fitness,
everything moving, pretty muchall through that time, um, as
well as towards the end.
And then.
(02:58):
Became an executive coach, didsome years of executive
coaching, and then just seeing alot of the struggles that
individuals have became muchmore focused on health coaching.
And I know that can be kind of ageneric, broad term.
I see now where I am as more ofa Metabolic Health Coach really
(03:20):
focusing in on the benefits ofgood metabolic health,
particularly as I age andeveryone around us is aging.
Um, it's not something we canget around and, um, have, uh,
done various things throughoutthat, that, that time on the
Pilates studio with my husband.
(03:41):
Have our own coaching business,Square One Wellness Coaching.
But right now, currently.
I'm working for heart surgeon,Dr.
Philip Ovadia, who has OvadiaHeart Health.
He's written a fabulous book.
I recommend to a lot of people'Stay Off My Operating Table'
which is something we'd all liketo do, not be on the heart
(04:04):
surgeon's operating table.
As their Director of EmployeeWellness Programs, I also do
metabolic coaching for them, buttrying to really focus now in on
the work site, employeewellness, uh, employee metabolic
health.
Nigel Rawlins (04:21):
in many ways, you've got a new job.
And what's interesting aboutthis new job, you're about my
age, you've started a new careerin your late 60s.
Krisna Hanks (04:33):
Isn't that fun?
Isn't that fun?
Yes.
I definitely subscribe to theidea of maintaining work at some
point.
Maybe there'll come a time whereI say, okay, I'm done.
Um, I just want to go retire,but I feel I have a passion.
(04:54):
I love what I do.
I love working with the Ovadiateam.
Um, I love.
Partnering with my, my husband,Robert on various projects as
well.
And it just feels right tocontinue working and maybe there
will come a day, well, when I'llsay no, but like yourself, um,
(05:14):
I'm still energized by what Ido.
And I still would love tocontribute.
I'm still
Nigel Rawlins (05:19):
trying to work out what it is that I'm doing,
but I do think, I do thinkyou're right about the movement.
That we are born to move, andour whole world revolves around
moving and if anyone was to see,now we are audio only, but if
you see a picture of Krisna,she's lean and she's incredibly
fit and she looks very veryyoung.
(05:39):
You do not look your age at all.
Krisna Hanks (05:42):
Well, thank you very much.
I am.
Yeah.
And moving has definitely alwaysbeen something I felt I've had
an affinity.
My mother would always say sheasked me around the age of
three, what I wanted to be inalready, then I said, I wanted
to be a dancer.
Yeah.
So maybe there's somethinginherent in it, but thank you
(06:04):
very much for the compliment.
Nigel Rawlins (06:06):
Now I think people will see for themselves
and it's something to aim for.
So let's start talk a little bitabout why I contacted you this
time.
Ovadia Heart Health put out awhite paper.
So let's talk a little bit aboutwhat the subject of that is.
So can you tell me somethingabout that?
Because I'm assuming you wereinvolved in that white paper as
well.
Krisna Hanks (06:24):
Yes, I, I penned that paper with the oversight
of, uh, of Dr.
Ovedia, uh, and our medicalteam.
Actually, we have a nursepractitioner and other
clinicians, uh, on the team.
So this white paper is about thedetrimental effects of sedentary
(06:44):
behavior, particularly with alittle emphasis on the
workplace.
That said, I'm going to caveatthat.
Many people who work from home,many people who are even just
retired or partially working,are spending a lot of hours
sitting.
(07:05):
So while the emphasis may beslightly towards those, uh,
still in the workplace.
The workplace is everywhere, itmight be your kitchen table, it
might be an office you've madein your house.
You might be in an office.
I just do a little back historyon why this topic became very
(07:26):
interesting to me, but alsoclose by.
So in 2010, uh, we were livingin the San Francisco Bay Area.
And I was at that time, themembership director of a group
called the Stanford HealthPromotion Network, SHPN.
(07:47):
And this is out of StanfordUniversity.
It was a consortium of companieswithin that San Francisco,
primarily Silicon Valley area,uh, wanting to incorporate more
employee wellness programs intotheir companies.
So we had the likes of Google,Facebook, okay, all the big tech
(08:09):
companies, but also many othersmaller nonprofits from the
various locations.
All interested in how can weimprove the health of our
employees and anyone associatedwith us.
So Stanford organized in 2010,the first conference on what
(08:30):
they called then the science ofsedentary behavior.
This was a little bit of akickoff.
They were, um, unveiling kind ofa new department, a new thing
called the Center for Longevity.
So this was one of their firstprojects.
And I was invited as a worksitewellness consultant, along with
(08:52):
many researchers.
It was not a conference open tothe public, but just by people
connected and working activelyin that field.
But one of the most interestingthings about this conference was
you could not present with aPowerPoint.
They allowed no PowerPoints.
They had no presentation.
(09:12):
You were just asked to talkabout what you were doing.
Um, that way to have interactionwith each other.
I thought that was just amazing.
Absolutely fascinating.
But in this conference, therewas some particular work and I
have right here and we can putthis in the show notes.
One of the first individuals tospeak is actually from your
(09:35):
country, Dr.
Neville Owen and GenevieveHealy.
Their paper, I thought, was thespark for pretty much everyone
there.
It's titled, Too Much Sitting,The Population Health Science of
Sedentary Behavior.
And just to make this a littlemore realistic, what was
(09:56):
completely fascinating to me assomeone who spent my life in the
moving fields, I have twodegrees in kinesiology, is that
their research was pointingtowards too much sitting is not
the same as too little exercise.
And it was this whole sort ofdiving deeper into the fact that
(10:21):
actually metabolic markers wereimpacted by what they called
prolonged hours of sitting.
They even came up with thesetwo, two terms called a
prolonger.
That would be someone who had,you know, multiple hours of
sitting back to back as opposedto a breaker.
(10:43):
Someone in even they gaveexamples of someone who's kind
of fidgety, right?
I just moving around and wouldeven like sit up and stand up.
Those could be considered breaksand that this moved away from
what had been much of ourthinking of all you have to do
is do your you know with thethis various groups recommend
(11:06):
150 minutes a week of exercise,two times a week of strength
training and all these thingsand you'll be fine.
And they even came up with afunny term, which I use a lot in
when I'm speaking, the activecouch potato.
Meaning you can do everythingcorrectly.
You can hit all the markers.
You're doing your strengthtraining.
(11:27):
You're doing cardiovasculartraining.
You're doing stretching.
But if you're sitting formultiple hours, some of this
good work that you're doing foryourself is negated.
And I just thought that wasfascinating.
It kind of blew, blew my mindfor lack of a better way to say
(11:48):
it, to say, okay, we have torethink how we are approaching
our daily lives.
Nigel Rawlins (11:57):
Now, and that's interesting because that's quite
a while back and now it'sstarting to emerge and it does
It seems to be the case that,um, you know, people realize
things and there are theoriesand studies, but it can take
many years before it comes intothe mainstream.
For example, metabolic health.
Um, we've probably known aboutthat for many, many years.
So let's talk a little bit aboutabout what sedentary behavior is
(12:22):
and what problems is it causing.
So sitting down's one.
I guess the other one is sittingin bed watching TV at night,
sitting and watching TV.
Krisna Hanks (12:33):
Correct.
And I just kind of want to makesure I hit these numbers
correct.
So, When we think aboutactivity, and we point this out
in our white paper, there's aclassification that's called a
MET, M E T, a MetabolicEquivalent of Task.
(12:53):
And this early reason is It istrue, right?
We're talking 2010.
Here we are 2024.
Takes things a long time, right?
To, to change.
So a metabolic equivalent oftask, something like sitting or
long term stationary is down inthat one, I think to 1.
(13:19):
5.
And, they utilize not only justNeville Owen, Genevieve Healy,
but there's interestingresearch, Mark Hamilton who
worked at Pennington BiomedicalResearch Center.
They use this term called lightintensity exercise, which can be
just standing up, starting towalk, lifting your legs up,
(13:41):
things that use, um, sort ofrather larger group muscles like
our quadriceps, the front of thethigh, gluteus muscles, the seat
muscles, postural muscles.
And this went to a level stayingunder around a three MET.
And if you think otheractivities, so above the three
would be what we would classifya little more as moderate
(14:04):
intensity exercise.
And then we start going in thisrange from three MET to eight
MET.
Those would be things likebiking, swimming, walking with a
little more vigorousness,running.
Um, and then obviously, veryvigorous would be really kind of
high intensity.
So the MET qualifies it.
(14:26):
Uh, and this is something thenthat can be measured through
accelerometers and other tools.
Um, and it's not like it's aperfect measurement.
Somebody says, well, how do Iknow if I'm doing light or
moderate?
And we will even use thingslike, well, light's just
(14:47):
basically kind of changing yourbody position in, in many ways.
Moderate is more of a consistentactivity, but yet you're not
really raising that heart ratesuper high.
You could still carry on a niceconversation, you and I could
talk easily.
When we get into the vigorous,that's when it might be harder
to carry on a conversation and,uh, you need more focus, The old
(15:11):
talk test, your breath and your,your talking are changing.
Nigel Rawlins (15:15):
So basically, I'm assuming what I'm hearing is
that if you keep your MET levelaround one most of the day, you
are really a couch potato andit's going to create problems
for your health.
So you need to vary it.
Krisna Hanks (15:29):
Yes, you need to vary it and we'll talk about
ways to do that, but I want toread one clip from, or one
little phrase to show that exactsort of definition of
physiologically what is changingand why this research also just
totally ties into wanting to beand help individuals improve
(15:53):
their metabolic health.
So this comes again from thatpaper from Neville Owen and all
and, um, physiologically, It'sbeen suggested that the loss of
local contractile stimulationinduced through sitting leads to
(16:13):
both the suppression of skeletalmuscle lipoprotein lipase,
something called LPL activity,and this is necessary for the
for triglyceride uptake and HDL,which is high density
lipoprotein cholesterolproduction and reduced glucose
(16:34):
uptake.
And that's, a bunch of sort offancy scientific words, but what
we're talking about is acompromise on our metabolic
system in a nutshell.
And we have five markers ofmetabolic health.
We have waist circumference,blood pressure, blood glucose,
(16:57):
which we just mentioned,triglycerides, which we just
mentioned and HDL, which we justmentioned.
So, we have our metabolic healthprimary markers being influenced
when we're sitting for back toback hours, right?
Now, I will caveat a lot of thisresearch.
(17:18):
At first, it was monitoredthrough individuals, you know,
sort of self recording theirhours, and then they moved on to
more sophisticated, where, wherethey could actually track them
with accelerometers, so itwasn't their own reporting.
And actually, then what we sawwas they were sitting even more.
So, it has a real direct
Nigel Rawlins (17:38):
Yeah, That's one of the issues I think that we're
seeing with a lot of studies isself reporting is not accurate
at all.
It's almost made up.
So you talked about the fivemetabolic health markers there.
So sedentary behavior isactually causing trouble with
all of those.
So let's have a little talkabout what's the benefit of
(17:59):
metabolic health.
And because one of the issueshere is, you and I, because
we're older, and hopefully myaudience is listening, is, is
trying to look at ways they cankeep their metabolic health
going into their 80s and, andolder, and often, like yourself
and myself, to keep working.
But not to age cognitively, sowe can still think, we can still
(18:22):
reflect on things, and still doour jobs, you know, and think.
So, what are the benefits ofmetabolic health, that you were
talking about?
Krisna Hanks (18:32):
Excellent question.
And think that the knowledgebase just exploded and expanded
on metabolic health.
And a lot of it really justsprung up like a rocket ship
also during COVID because we sawthat individuals who had poor
metabolic health, who hadunderlying chronic conditions,
(18:52):
were at a greater risk for, uh,catching the virus.
So that catapulted a lot to themainstream, but we've known for
years individuals who have poormetabolic health and
particularly individuals whomight be more, what we would
call insulin resistant asopposed to insulin sensitive,
(19:14):
um, also at a greater risk fortype two diabetes, for heart
health, for many of theautoimmune diseases, a host of
chronic conditions, and thereare a lot of not only heart
surgeons, I'm working with anamazing heart surgeon, but all
kinds of other doctors invarious realms looking at trying
(19:38):
to help their patients improvemetabolic health in order to
prevent some of these diseases,which we now kind of, sadly, are
saying anybody who ages is goingto automatically get ill.
One of the phrases I like toutilize is don't accept that
just because you age, you needor are automatically become,
(20:01):
become ill.
And one of those preventivemeasures is to look at your
metabolic health markers, try toimprove all the other lifestyle
factors, not only that influencemetabolic health, but just allow
you to have a little morecontrol over your health.
We know sleep, managing, havinggood sleep hygiene, managing
(20:23):
your stress, having good stressmanagement practice, getting
regular exercise and nutritionthat does not contribute to this
picture of insulin resistance orinsulin sensitivity, meaning
that you're really managingwell, your blood glucose
(20:44):
management, which then meansyou're managing your insulin.
Oh, it's all definitely tiesinto that.
And inflammation, you know, is abig word that gets used a lot,
but improving your metabolichealth is meaning that you're
also lowering a lot of thosemarkers that could be
contributing to inflammation inthe
Nigel Rawlins (21:05):
Now, What's interesting about this is we're
becoming better educated aboutmetabolic health and looking
after ourselves, but the bigissue is to actually do it, put
it into practice.
And you're also talking aboutthere is measuring it.
And I would suggest that thatmeans working closely with your
doctor.
What did I hear about, I don'tknow if it was on of your
(21:27):
newsletters, was it?
I think, um, somebody was on 15medications.
Was that your newsletter that Iread then?
Krisna Hanks (21:36):
It was, it was a, it was a, uh, a blog post.
Yes.
Yes.
Yes,
Nigel Rawlins (21:40):
and that was a young per well, young to us.
Well,
Krisna Hanks (21:44):
to us, young to us, and that sadly has been
accepted that is, it is okay.
Um, I do want to touch on onepoint that you brought up and I
just want to make sure we don'tmiss it.
You talked about cognition as weage and metabolic health is even
(22:05):
being tied into that.
Good metabolic health.
Now we even have a term,metabolic psychiatry, which is a
rapidly growing field, where wehave clinical psychiatrists, two
of the very most prominent inthat field are Dr.
Christopher Palmer from HarvardUniversity.
(22:25):
His book is called Brain Energy.
Dr.
Georgia Ede, her book is, ChangeYour Diet, Change your mind, I
believe.
Sorry if I didn't say correctly,but it's a fabulous book.
She's also a clinicalpsychiatrist, used to be at
Harvard.
She's now, uh, I've been workingon her own.
Both tie good nutrition tobetter brain health.
(22:49):
Obviously, they use medicationsand pharmaceuticals in their
practice with their patients.
However, there are patients whopharmaceuticals don't work for,
and they show good promise.
They're, they're utilizing theketogenic diet to improve brain
health from various, disordersfrom attention deficit to
bipolar to depression.
(23:10):
Again, this is not saying aneither or, but that there are
options.
So we see also, this is a line,I believe, Dr.
Georgie Ede, you can't separatethe brain from the body.
They work together.
And this is a great philosophywhen we think about metabolic
health and good metabolic healthin our body.
(23:33):
It means good metabolic healthfor our brain.
Um, and this, I think for ourage group, Nigel, us young ones,
yeah, is important because whodoesn't want to live
independently, uh, and havetheir brain functioning on all
cylinders.
Nigel Rawlins (23:51):
The other big thing is, the older we are, as
long as we've been continuing tolearn and we've, we've developed
a solid body of knowledge, we'vestill got a big contribution to
make to, to help others.
Um, you know, our brains areobviously going to be different,
Different, say, younger person'sbrain, they've got a different
form of intelligence, they callit fluid intelligence.
(24:12):
Ours is a crystallizedintelligence.
But it's a matter of whether wecan keep recalling and keep
helping.
And that's what we've got toprotect when we're older.
That's why I love what you'retalking about.
So, alright, we've talked aboutthe health risks of sedentary
behavior.
How much sedentary behavior isout there?
Do you think?
Krisna Hanks (24:32):
That is a million dollar question, I would say.
And it's not only from theresearch that I've cited, and I
encourage everyone, and we canput some extra links in the show
notes to look at this workthemselves.
There are many more, in fact,many people are using this
saying that sitting is the newsmoking, right?
(24:53):
I don't like to go down the fearcampaign rabbit hole, but I, I
think what's important to knowis back to back hours are not
good for anybody.
So in some of the originalresearch they had shown,
particularly detrimental forpeople who were doing over four
hours in a row.
Okay.
(25:13):
Um, we now know most people arekind of aware that's not a good
number to be striving, but Ilike to say you know at a
minimum, you're doing some kindof body change position every
hour to not get yourself soabsorbed in that project you're
working on, uh, on yourcomputer.
For some people, they need toset a timer, for some people,
(25:35):
they have a thermos.
So they're drinking either somecoffee, some tea, some water,
which automatically makes themget up to use the restroom a
little bit more.
That's a good thing.
And what we saw again, goes backto this conversation on the MET
the metabolic equivalent task.
It can be just as simple as youstand up, walk around your chair
(25:57):
and you come back and sit.
I like to tell people do, do acertain number of air squats
every day when you're behindthat computer.
And it can be, you know, you cando even a little bit more if you
want to get up and feelenthusiastic, do a couple
jumping jacks or something likethat.
But think of it like metabolicsparks.
(26:19):
Like you, you changed yourposture, you changed your
position, you got yourself to alittle bit higher MET activity
level.
And this seems to stimulate yourmetabolic processes.
I've often used the analogy ofif you sit back to back hours,
it's almost as if your bodythought you went to sleep and it
(26:40):
doesn't need to really doanything.
And in fact, we do see peoplewho do too many back to back
hours have trouble sleeping.
That it can be a sleep disrupterif we haven't had enough of
these light intensity exercises.
And there, people have gottenway creative, some people in
(27:00):
call centers are using treadmilldesk and various things.
But even here now, I work a lotof hours from home.
I'm sitting now, but I have astanding position where I can
stand up to do coaching sessionsor other team calls.
It's the variety that matters.
And I think we need to thinkabout this also for people who
(27:22):
will binge watch on Netflix.
I mean, how many episodes in arow are you going to watch?
It's not just when you'reabsorbed in doing an Excel sheet
on something on your computer.
Nigel Rawlins (27:36):
Well, I was just thinking it's, if you're binge
watching Netflix, you'reprobably eating, um, foods.
That, that was the point I wasgoing to make.
I remember the good old dayswhen we only had TV.
When the ads came on, we all gotup to make a cup of tea or go to
the toilet or something likethat.
We moved.
Whereas nowadays with yourstreaming, and I only prefer to
(27:58):
watch streaming nowadays, so Idon't watch normal TV, um, yeah,
I have to force myself.
And I was just going to say overthe back there, that's an under
desk treadmill that I boughtrecently.
It's a only a couple hundreddollars.
And that's Australian dollarstoo, which American dollars
would be much, much cheaper.
American dollars is much, muchbetter than Australian dollars.
(28:19):
So about$240, you can have anunder desk and you only have to
move the desk up and just do it.
I use it for online learning ifI want to learn something.
I'll walk whilst I'm watchingsomething.
Um, so yeah, there's all sortsof ways.
But the other thing aboutsitting too long that I noticed,
your back bends.
So you're starting to changeyour posture as well and stiffen
(28:40):
up your body, especially aroundthe shoulders.
Krisna Hanks (28:42):
Yes, yes, there's all kinds of, uh, you know, uh,
postural issues that come out ofthose long hours because the
body becomes sort of passive,uh, we call it, you know, you
get yourself into that bananaposition, tension in the
shoulders and neck and, and themovement can actually stimulate
(29:03):
that, also, I know that, Nigel,you work with a lot of women.
And the results from theseAustralian studies, but also the
ongoing work in this field oflooking, at breaking up our
sitting time, actually the womenfared worse in these studies
(29:24):
than the men, and not to saythat men should go ahead and sit
for back to back hours, but thisis also one of the reasons I
sort of dove into this area alittle bit more is, it's
important to understand thatalso some of these issues we
have to pay more attention tothan the men do.
Nigel Rawlins (29:45):
That was my concern.
Well, I'm assuming that whenwomen get to a certain age, they
might actually retire.
And if they haven't gotsomething else to do, put it
this way, I was thinking about afamily member whose movement is,
is being reduced more and moreand is struggling to get out of
chairs and stuff like that.
And so when you can't move,you're restricted to a smaller
(30:08):
and smaller space.
And at some point it meansyou're in a home and, and that's
the biggest fear was, and, andwhen you're in a home, you're
being cared for, and I know whenmy mum moved into a home, she
didn't last much longer.
Krisna Hanks (30:21):
Right.
Right.
So that trajectory is a sad onethat is very known these days.
And I think something like thiswhere we can approach it from
all the fields.
That's why I find working inemployee wellness with the
Ovidia team so fascinating isone of the things that breaking
(30:42):
up sitting time is a reallyimportant piece that a lot of
people could participate in.
That's where they could start.
So let's say physical activity,they have some other
complications that are hinderingfrom that.
This is one area that they couldstart little baby steps to
improve in, uh, is the littlethings, maybe, you know, finding
(31:05):
some ways to move their legsunderneath their chair, to move
their arms, to practice in asmall way, getting up slightly
from your chair and gettingdown, even if they can't exactly
get up all the way.
Getting a sturdy chair that hasarms in it, where they can push
down themselves.
It is a piece that doesn'trequire all the strenuous
(31:29):
activity, but a really goodsolid piece to start with.
As well as trying to improvethose metabolic markers.
Nigel Rawlins (31:36):
I keep thinking about my mentor.
Unfortunately, he had a fall inold age and that finished him
off just about.
But before he passed away theywere trying to get him to do
squats so that you could sit andget out of the seat.
I mean, it's simple things likesquatting, you know, it's, it's
just scary how you can lose it.
(31:58):
All right, is this all ages thatthey need to start or is there
differences about what you cando?
Because I'm, again, if we, wethink about old, say, women,
what can they start doing ifthey've suddenly realised their
body has changed and that's whathappens, our bodies go a bit
south when we get a bit olderand we're sort of thinking, oh,
I really do need to do somethingabout this.
(32:20):
How can they start to get out ofthat active couch potato.
What, what should they be doing?
Krisna Hanks (32:25):
Well, if someone's actually an active couch potato,
they might be alreadyexercising, right?
That's kind of the definition ofit.
They're doing all the otherrecommended exercise, but
they're, they're sitting toomuch.
But I think the general questionis, what can people do?
Well, we know sort of littlekids, they don't stop moving.
(32:46):
They're pretty much going 24sevens.
We get into the teenage years,so I think.
This is something that maybeparents need to, to have a look
at is also how much time aretheir kids spending on their
devices and looking at ways tohelp break them up.
Um, there was a small study, nottoo long ago, it was only on 50
(33:07):
people that showed that even ifthey did one less hour of
actual, uh, phone time, theirdevices.
In their leisure hours, theywere, they showed some benefits
health wise.
Um, but I think any age is agood age to start looking at
(33:27):
this right now because we allhave a great portion of our
lives, uh, connected or tied totechnology.
And I think the big takeaway ofour conversation is here is yes,
do all the activity that youlove doing.
If you love dancing, if you lovePilates, if you love walking,
hiking, if you're strengthtraining, we talked about that
(33:50):
last time in episode 13.
I'm a big proponent of strengthtraining for anyone over the age
of 50, particularly, to keepyour muscle maintenance or, to
manage your muscles, and toensure also that you're, if you
do fall, you've got some goodstrong muscles to support you.
And, um, but I think whetheryou're in the 30s, 40s, 50s,
(34:16):
understanding that too muchsitting is It's not the same as
too little exercise because I, Ido see, and I work with many
young people, I do see youngpeople who do lots of wonderful
physical activity, but they willsit for hours behind their
laptop, texting, you know,Instagram, TikTok, watching
(34:38):
video after video.
I think it's important for them.
Obviously, We have more, let'ssay, to worry metabolically.
They, they have their youth tosort of help them carry them on
for a while, but at a certainpoint that youth won't be, um,
you know, carrying them as theygo through the various hormonal
(35:00):
changes.
Not only from this research, butjust in my own work, I think
anyone above the age of 50should take breaking up their
sitting time very seriously.
Nigel Rawlins (35:12):
The other thing in there too, with the strength
training, one of the problemsabout being older is that we
don't even use the proteinproperly.
That younger people can, becausethey can eat some protein and
their body uses it.
Whereas when we're older, weneed so much more for it to
actually, be used.
Krisna Hanks (35:30):
Very good point.
Sadly, as we age, we're not asefficient as processing that
protein and like getting yourprotein.
That's one of the things we workon with the Ovidia team and also
my husband and I and our processis really helping people get to
get a good protein target.
We use the words prioritizeprotein, uh, at every meal.
(35:52):
It doesn't matter how manymeals, some people do two meal a
day.
Some people even work well withone meal a day, or even if
you're three meal a day, butreally making sure that your
protein target is spot on.
Nigel Rawlins (36:04):
It definitely helps with muscle.
I know at my age, I've beendoing strength training now for
five years, so I've actually gotsome muscle definition, but I
think all the strength trainingI'm doing at my age is just
maintaining what I've got.
I don't think it's able to growmuch more.
So, because I think thedeterioration as we get older is
quite significant.
(36:25):
So, um, you know, I'm fightingjust to keep up with keeping
what I've got.
But, if I hadn't have done fiveyears, I don't think I'd be as
well defined as I am, you couldsay that.
Um, I just noticed with youngerpeople, their skin's a lot more
elastic than ours and looks abit better.
Krisna Hanks (36:42):
But they, they have a little more help from the
growth hormone that we don'thave so much assistance from
that as we age, but you know, asI like to say, we've got two
levers.
In that muscle maintenance,category to pull you can pull
the protein one.
I'm a big proponent of animalfoods is a big source of protein
(37:04):
power because of the goodbioavailability of it.
You've got another lever andthat's your strength training.
You want to try to be makingsure as we age that you're
pulling both of those levers.
Nigel Rawlins (37:15):
So let's talk a little bit about how you help
companies.
So obviously that's, that'swhere the aim is now to get into
the companies where people havegot sedentary behavior.
So what does a, a program looklike if you're going into a
company to help them?
Krisna Hanks (37:31):
Great question.
So, I'll just utilize an exampleof working currently with a
manufacturing company.
Manufacturing company hasmultiple shifts.
They're actually working prettymuch 24 seven, but you have
three distinct shifts.
And our focus with Ovidia HeartHealth is metabolic health.
(37:55):
We have oversight, uniqueoversight with having a heart
surgeon looking over our contentand our problems.
Our major focus is having that,that interaction.
So we're on site.
We're going to the factory sixtimes in the year.
We do education, we doempowerment, we do some one on
(38:16):
one coaching for specificthings.
We help lay this foundation ofunderstanding what metabolic
health is.
It's understanding the lifestylepieces that contribute to good
metabolic health.
They do some initial lab work,those labs are then reviewed by
our medical team.
(38:36):
And then we do lab work at theend of the program so that they
can have a comparison to lookwhat doing some lifestyle
changes might offer them.
It's very much bringing this.
to them.
A lot of worksite wellness inthe past has been disease
management focused.
(38:57):
And I don't know if that term isutilized in your country or not,
but disease management basicallymeans we work with you only when
you're sick.
For example, in years past in aworksite wellness program, if
you wanted to participate in thenutrition program, you needed to
be diabetic.
You couldn't take the nutritionprogram unless you had some sort
(39:19):
of disease.
Our focus is to flip thataround, away from disease
management towards building afoundation for good metabolic
health.
Nigel Rawlins (39:32):
And long term health from the sound of it.
So that's a fairly enlightenedemployer to, to want to look
after their employees like that.
So, and that sounds like asignificant investment,
especially with blood tests.
Um, I'd say the interestingthing there is if you've never
had those blood tests before,and they give you some
indicators, it's a jolt to dosomething about it, but you're
(39:54):
there also to explain, well, youknow, here you are now, this is
where you've got to get to.
That that's very, verysupportive.
I'd say one of the issues too,where people are working three
shifts, that can really muck uptheir metabolism too, if you're
stuck on the night shift.
Krisna Hanks (40:10):
Yes, there are strategies we need to do to work
with individuals to help themboost their circadian rhythm.
Sleep hygiene in that way.
And that's why it's always thatwhole package, uh, of all these
pieces.
It's not just your lab results,but it's the work you have on
how can you improve some ofthese other factors where you
(40:30):
might have another barrier thatyou just you can't change.
Many of them love their jobs,but yeah, the, the cycle and the
time is more of a challenge.
And you're absolutely a hundredpercent right.
The employer is veryenlightened, the CEO.
Um, and this is what it's goingto take.
And in America, the employersare often covering the costs of
(40:52):
the healthcare.
And this is a differentapproach.
Can we improve our health care,and our health and wellbeing of
our employees, not wait untilthey get sick.
And this is a definite differentphilosophy.
Not every employer isenlightened like that.
Thank goodness there are some,and hopefully there are more
(41:15):
growing.
And, this is a chance to have alarger scope and broaden the
knowledge base of all kinds ofpeople about the benefits of
metabolic health.
Nigel Rawlins (41:29):
The last thing I want to do is end up in a
hospital from something that Icould have, um, prevented, you
know, over the years.
Uh, we're very lucky inAustralia, we do have public
health, so if we have anaccident, we're straight into
hospital and there is no cost.
Which is fantastic, where youhear some horror stories about
the costs of medical treatmentin America, and we can't
(41:50):
understand it in Australia, thatyou don't have a good public
health system.
Krisna Hanks (41:54):
And it's, it's very interesting also to think
about health, right?
You help a lot of entrepreneurs,Nigel.
You're, you're working withpeople, various levels.
Some are employed, some are selfemployed.
And when we think about ourhealth, right?
Back to the old thing, you can'tseparate the body from the
(42:15):
brain.
It's also about performance.
And we, not only as agingcreatures, right?
But if we're not well, and ifwe're not well metabolically,
it's hard to perform well.
And this is also somethingthat's been known in the
workforce.
You know, you want to, you doexecutive coaching, you want
(42:36):
your team to have high levelperformance skills and
communication and negotiationand sales and everything.
It's really hard to do any ofthose things, if your physical
body and your mental body aren'twell, and that's where I think
the exciting point and theexciting place to be in employee
wellness is that point rightthere.
(42:59):
What are we doing to improve andput the performance of ourselves
as the leadership team or CEO oranyone else, but also our
employees to take it to anotherlevel.
Nigel Rawlins (43:12):
Which is what the knowledge economy is all about.
Having a high level cognitiveability is definitely a
competitive advantage.
So anyone who's working in thatsort of area really does need to
keep their brain really on theball, and that means your body.
Is there anything else that
Krisna Hanks (43:33):
First I want to say thank you again for the
opportunity to talk with you.
I always love sharing ideas andI think I encourage everyone to
do their research in terms ofmetabolic health.
We spend a lot of time at workand those hours should also be
supporting our health choices.
(43:54):
To open up that conversationabout metabolic health.
But on our topic today, alsotalking about ways that you can
break up your sitting time.
Um, there's substantial researchout there to show that people
who take many breaks are higherperformers as opposed to those
(44:15):
people who, you know, in thisresearch, you classify them as
prolongers, those who sits forhours or breakers.
And we all know that if we'reworking on a project, we step
outside, get a little bit offresh air.
We come back.
Suddenly it seems to click forus to encourage others to
(44:36):
support these practices.
Nigel Rawlins (44:37):
Well that is brilliant.
Okay, there is the whitepaperthat can be downloaded, but how
would you like people to connectwith you, Krisna?
Krisna Hanks (44:45):
So absolutely.
Certainly the white paper can bedownloaded for free.
That's at the Ovadia HeartHealth.
com slash wellness page.
And we can put that in thelinks.
And in that paper, I also cite alot of the research we talked
about today.
My website with my husband,Robert is square one, the number
(45:08):
one wellness com.
I'm on LinkedIn just by my name.
I'm on Twitter at square onewellness and Instagram, the same
square one wellness.
So, I'm out there.
Nigel Rawlins (45:21):
You're definitely out there.
I see you on Twitter a lot.
Alright, thank you very much,Krisna, for joining me.
Krisna Hanks (45:27):
Thank you again.
It's an honor to be a repeatingcustomer here and keep doing the
fabulous work that you're doingfor all those women, but men as
well in the working space.
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