St. Louis Injury & Rehabilitaion Center

Morning Lagging? Drink Some Water!

drbcragg — Sun, 06 May 2012 17:35:58 +0000

– The skin on your lips is 200 times more sensitive than your fingertips.

– Pain occurs when sounds are above 130 db (decibels).

– Lack of water is the #1 trigger of daytime fatigue.

– Stress can result in more headaches as a result of the body rerouting blood flow to other parts of the body.

– Dieters who sleep more take off more fat that those who sleep less.

– Wearing headphones for an hour increases the bacteria in your ear 700 times.

– It takes twice as long to lose new muscle if you stop working out than it did to gain it.

– Your ears secrete more earwax when you are afraid than when you aren’t.

– When you take a step, you are using up to 200 muscles.

– The lifespan of a tastebud is ten days.

– Your tongue is the only muscle in your body that is attached at only one end.

– Your stomach produces a new layer of mucus every two weeks so that it doesn’t digest itself.

Healthy 2012 Tips

drbcragg — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 17:48:47 +0000

Tip 1: Movement

Yes, we understand that you may work at a desk in front of a computer nine hours everyday so your options may be limited, and after work you may feel so tired that you don’t even have the energy to work out. Not so fun-fact: roughly 250,000 deaths per year in the U.S. are directly related to a lack of regular exercise.*

A half hour a day of exercise is recommended, but recent studies show that shorter, spaced out workouts in a day can also do the trick. So if you’re feeling cooped up in your office, break up the day by taking small walks around your building to bump up your heart rate instead of dreading a workout before or after work.

courtesy of The Georgetown Dish.com

Expo Raffle Winners!

drbcragg — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 15:54:08 +0000

Congratulations to Tony T and Kelly S, who are the winners of our expo raffle! They receive a post workout recovery session (stretching, massage, and care) with their training group, courtesy of the SLIR team.

Sweet Chocolatey Facts

drbcragg — Mon, 23 Apr 2012 17:46:57 +0000

Cultures around the world have enjoyed chocolate in its many forms for a thousand years or more. In its earlier days, the Mayans and Aztecs sipped a chocolate beverage during sacred and religious ceremonies. Later, Europeans enjoyed chocolate enhanced by refined sugar and milk as dessert and candies. There are powerful scientific properties and findings that relate to chocolate. From its processing to potential health benefits, here are five fun facts about your favorite treat:

Chocolate is made from the seed of the Theobroma cacao tree. In its raw form, the seed possesses a bitter flavor. In the production of chocolate, the seeds are fermented in order to change the flavor.
Due to a high concentration in flavanols, recent research suggests that the cardiovascular system may benefit from chocolate. Flavanols improve blood flow to the heart and brain, lower blood pressure and have antioxidant qualities.
Flavanols are also the reason for chocolate’s natural bitter taste. The more processing that occurs in creating your favorite candy, less flavanols remain in the chocolate. Less flavanols means less healthy. Food manufacturers are currently exploring techniques to preserve flavanols in the manufacturing process.
The specific flavanol thought to be responsible for most of these cardiovascular benefits is called “epicatechin.”
Research into the potential health benefits of chocolate was in-part inspired by the Kuna people of Panama, who drink five to seven cups per day of a cocoa drink. The Kuna people have higher kidney function and lower rates of heart disease than other Panamanians, which sparked interest in the possible correlation between the cocoa drink and health.

The earliest documented consumption of chocolate was in 1100 BC, and it has remained one of the world’s most popular food types and flavors. Now isn’t that delicious? You know what I have the taste for right now?

GoStLouis Post Race Recap

drbcragg — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 17:44:57 +0000

We wanted to send our thanks to everyone for stopping by our booth at the Expo last weekend. Our “Ask the Doctor” kept us busy and we enjoyed it! Winners of the training group recovery session will be announced Thursday. Keep posted on our site!

Fun Facts About Heart Health! (3)

drbcragg — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 17:45:11 +0000

Women’s Hearts Beat Faster Than Men’s

A female human heart pumps about six beats faster per minute than a male heart, which can be explained by the gender difference in heart size. A male heart is bigger (by about 25 percent), so it can pump more blood in a single beat.

But having a quicker heart beat doesn’t equal quicker finishing times for runners. Because men’s hearts can pump more blood, on average, they tend to run faster than women.

Your Heart Doesn’t Stop When You Sneeze

The increased pressure in your chest can affect blood flow to the heart, briefly changing its rhythm, but contrary to common belief, your heart doesn’t skip a beat when you sneeze. That doesn’t mean you should stop saying “bless you” or “gesundheit” after a sneeze, though. It’s only polite!

Despite the name, your heart doesn’t stop during heart failure either. It just can’t pump blood as well as it should. The only time the heart stops is during cardiac arrest.

MAINTAIN HEALTHY HAPPY HEARTS – inside and out!

Fun Facts About Heart Health! (2)

drbcragg — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 17:43:15 +0000

A Cold Heart Isn’t Always a Bad Thing!

Therapeutic hypothermia is actually a form of treatment for cardiac arrest. According to American Heart Association guidelines for inducing hypothermia, doctors cool a patient’s body to 91 degrees F, 7 degrees below average, in order to slow damage to brain and other organs that begin when the heart stops and restarts.

Research published in the Annals of Neurology in late 2010 found that two-thirds of patients who received the therapy after revival from cardiac arrest recovered and went home with good heart function.

Monday is the Most Common Day of the Week for Heart Attacks

Mondays get a bad rap — Manic Mondays, Monday blues, case of the Mondays — but where heart health is concerned, maybe it’s deserved. Research has shown that more heart attacks occur on Mondays than any other day of the week. One 2005 study published in the European Journal of Epidemiology found that the incidence of heart attack was 20 percent higher in men and 15 percent higher in women on Mondays.

Some experts theorize that the spike has to do with the stress of returning to work after a relaxing weekend, while others correlate Monday heart attacks with the effects of boozy Saturday nights.

Other common heart attack days, unfortunately, are Christmas, the day after Christmas, and New Year’s. Wow.

HAPPY HEALTHY HEARTS! – inside and out!

Fun Facts About Heart Health! (1)

drbcragg — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 17:41:19 +0000

The all-important heart is constantly at work, pumping blood (about 2,000 gallons a day) filled with essential oxygen and nutrients to your body’s organs 24/7. Everything about the heart and how it works is interesting, but here are some nuggets of information we found particularly fascinating.

The Heart Sits in the Center of the Chest, Not On the Left Side

Does this blow your mind because you’ve always been told it’s on the left? When we place our hands over our hearts to pledge allegiance, we actually go a tad too far to the left. The heart is located in the middle of the chest, snuggled between the lungs.

A small percentage of people are born with dextrocardia, a condition in which the heart points more toward the right side of the chest than the left. According to the National Organization for Rare Disorders, people who have dextrocardia with situs inversus (when visceral organs like the liver and spleen are reversed too) can live normal lives without any disability.

In many cases, though, dextrocardia is associated with other heart defects or other misplaced, and even missing, organs that might require surgery to correct.

It’s important to watch your normal heart rate over time, too. A recent study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association found people whose resting heart rates increased from under 70 beats per minute to more than 85 beats per minute over 10 years had a 90 percent increased risk of suffering from heart disease compared to those whose heart rates stayed around 70 beats per minute.

MAINTAIN HAPPY HEALTHY HEARTS – inside and out!

Dream a Little Dream …

drbcragg — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 17:39:05 +0000

– It takes about 20 seconds for a red blood cell to circle the whole body.

– Your ribs move about 5 million times a year, every time you breathe!

– Your heart rate can rise as much as 30% during a yawn.

– Your hair grows faster in the morning than at any other time of day.

– The average person has over 1,460 dreams a year!

– You inhale about 700,000 of your own skin flakes each day.

– When your face blushes, the lining of your stomach turns red, too.

– Unlike dogs, pigs, and some other mammals, humans cannot taste water. They taste only the chemicals and impurities in the water.

– There are more bacteria in your mouth than there are people in the world.

– The most pushups ever performed in one day was 46,001.

– The human heart creates enough pressure to squirt blood 30 ft.

– The aorta, the largest artery in the body, is almost the diameter of a garden hose.

More Laughter Really = Less Stress!

drbcragg — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 17:33:42 +0000

- If your DNA was stretched out it would reach to the moon 6,000 times.

- By weight, Bone is five times stronger than steel.

- Fidgeting can burn about 350 calories a day.

- It is possible for you to survive even after the removal of the spleen, the stomach, one kidney, one lung, 75% of the liver, 80% of the intestines, and almost every organ from the pelvic and groin area.

- Smokers get ten times more wrinkles than non-smokers.

- A human being loses an average of 40 to 100 strands of hair a day.

- A person can live without food for about a month, but only about a week without water.

- The levels of two stress hormones, cortisol and epinephrine which suppress the body’s immune system, will actually drop after a dose of laughter.

- Scientists estimate that laughing 100 times is equivalent to a 10-minute workout on a rowing machine.

- The human brain uses approximately as much energy as a 10 watt light bulb.

- Coughing can cause air to move through your windpipe faster than the speed of sound – over a thousand feet per second!