Exercise may be healthy, but it's also not happening. A medical advisory panel convened by the U.S. Public Health Service has thrown in the towel, no longer encouraging doctors to recommend exercise. The reason: No proof that patients heed such advice.
o In a recent article in the Annals of Internal Medicine, health researcher Karen Eden, Ph.D., reviewed eight studies in which doctors or nurses counseled sedentary patients to exercise. She found that not even follow-up phone calls were enough to get patients moving.
o The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force has overwritten a 1996 recommendation that primary-care physicians extol the benefits of exercise to sedentary patients. The task force instead issued a cautious statement that acknowledged the value of exercise but refrained from telling physicians what to say or do.
o At this time, only one cardiac rehabilitation patient in four is still exercising a year after heart surgery. Better results might be obtained with more comprehensive follow-up and specific goals for each patient. This could include written exercise prescriptions and referrals to exercise groups, according to Karen Eden.
