Meeting the Needs of Employers and Employees with Customized Wellness Programs [Podcast Series]

• [1:12] Providing customized wellness programs

• “I learned by doing and the employee wellness programs I learned by doing in partnership with my human resources director and partners because corporate wellness lives and breathes in human resources.  It's considered a benefit for a workforce. And as such, it needs to be aligned with the mission vision of the human resources department, of course the C-suite and leadership teams, as to what it is that should be provided to a workforce.”

• [4:12] Meeting the needs of employees

• “Let's talk to the C-suite and see what they know to be the truth of what it is that employees are facing challenges in with their health and wellness. And or, very important, what are the employee interests. And if we don't, if we didn't feel like we had a good pulse for that, then we would ask to add questions around health and wellness interests in the PRC survey, which is a standardized survey.”

• [9:22] Creating successful employee wellness programs

• “And one more layer is wellness ambassadors. So you've got this working committee, it's part of the internal stakeholder group, but the wellness ambassadors or wellness affiliates, whatever you'd like to call them, they are the workers in each and every department that can take the initiatives to each staff meeting to be the cheerleader, kind of to get the message out and get people excited.”

• [13:32] The success of walking programs

• “I think the most impactful by virtue of number of lives touched, which was one of our metrics, and improved health metrics, engagement and the feeling of having energy in a workforce and that if you weren't involved, you might be missing something creating that kind of stir and excitement was religiously over and over—it didn't matter how many themes we put on it, how many different ways we delivered it—it was truly our walking program…”

• [16:32] Employee wellness trends

• “I think employees’ voice equals employee choice. And because employees are looking for some of the things that improve mental health, meditation, breathing, yoga, Pilates, walking in nature, forest bathing, hiking, cold plunge. These are all gaining a great deal of interest and momentum. A lot more interest in outdoor activity, hiking, biking, walking, very exciting times. So it I think we're going to see a lot of innovation in corporate wellness in these next several years. Because what we've done in the past will maybe not necessarily suit employees’ needs with this changed work environment and changed interests of our consumers which drive a lot of what it is that we need to provide.” 

• [25:08] Incentivizing return to work

• “And I think social fitness and reducing the loneliness epidemic, which has been addressed by our Surgeon General, we could do so much more with the workplace as a hub of health and wellness.  We just need to innovate, and cross some bridges, build some bridges.”

• [28:08] Opportunity for fitness professionals

• “There's huge opportunity to take what it is that you do in your fitness business and bring it to corporate to employer sites. And it would be a huge help to an HR director to know you're in their community, and that you can help them, be their wellness partner, to provide all the things that employees are looking for and asking for because they don't have time and they don't know where to find us, the fit pros, right?”

Learning the Language of Movement [Podcast Series]

• [:55] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Ashley Hunter

• Ashley Hunter is the Founder and Executive Director at the Fit Kids Foundation.  

• She also serves on the CA Governor’s Council on Physical Fitness and Mental Well-Being.

• [1:12] Fit Kids Foundation origin story

• “And in trying to teach them sports found that I really needed to take a step back and help them build some basic movement skills because these kids just hadn't had an opportunity to move. So we weren't at let's learn sports yet, we were at let's move your bodies to build some muscles, strengthen your bones, feel really good about what your bodies can do and have some confidence in your physical abilities. And then hopefully, once I've helped you acquire some of those foundational movement skills, you will get into sports, maybe in high school when you have the chance to play on a school team.”

• [3:38] Learning the language of movement

• “But all kids, all people need to move and have that physical literacy for their lives. And when you help young kids, young people, learn those movements, learn to love being active, learn that it feels really good on your body and your mind when you move your body. They grow into adults who feel the same way and continue those behaviors. It's sort of like learning a language.”

• [5:41] Scaling the initiative

• “We can really scale if we give all of our digital content to teachers, after school teachers around the country, if we make it available to kids at home and we help kids when they're at school be active with our in-person curriculum. So we've had a lot of changes over the years. And I think we're at this really interesting place now where we have this awesome, really fun program. Kids love it, teachers love it. And it's really easy to get it anywhere.”

• [10:46] Addressing mental health

• “And we've had more people reaching out to us looking for our physical activity program because they have a group of kids who have mental health struggles, stress, anxiety, anything. And fortunately, teachers and the adults in their lives are recognizing it.”

• [12:40] Fitness, games and sports curriculum

• “We have this really unique combination of fitness, play, movement, games, and little bits and pieces of sports in each lesson. Our entire curriculum is 50 lessons. It's about an hour of physical activity per lesson. Far more than anybody ever gets through in a year actually.” 

• [16:03] Addressing intimidation (and future gymtimidation)

• “Our goal, too, is really to make the fitness portion of our curriculum not intimidating. I think a lot of adults who haven't had opportunities to be active as they've grown into adults, go to the gym with the best of intentions, but see equipment and aren't sure what to do and feel a little bit intimidated. So they lose interest and go home.”

• [17:29] Active kids do better

• “We know that kids who are active do better in school, they retain more information, they're better behaved. So when I hear of schools cutting PE departments or even just reducing PE minutes per week to something like 20 minutes once or twice a week, it's not enough, and it's doing such a disservice to kids.”

• [20:15] Return on investment in movement

• “And it's awesome to see so many more people recognizing, hey, if I give my kids these couple minutes of movement, they will do better throughout the rest of the day.”

• [21:49] Governor’s Council addressing mental health and well-being

• “The Council has a big goal to make sure all Californians thrive and have access to physical activity and mental health resources. There is a particular focus on youth and families, which is great, since that's sort of where my focus is. But we've taken a really thoughtful approach to understanding the problem. What are the obstacles that people face? What are some best practices around helping people move? Where are the best resources that we can share? And then how do we share them?”

• [24:14] California Moves

• “That's an event that we hope to repeat again this year and just a real honor for Fit Kids to be part of it. The Council also launched a website, move your body, calm your mind. And that's a great place for people to find resources, understand the work of the Council, but then also find places and inspiration for their own way to be active.”

• [25:23] Focusing time and resources on getting kids moving

• “So that's where our focus is. And we just keep doing what we're doing, knowing we're making a positive impact and hoping to be part of a larger solution that makes sure all kids, all people do have access to physical activity and understand that the benefits their bodies and their minds from being active.”

• [27:25] Addressing the fitness opportunity gap

• “So it's really important to me that we get to those kids and make Fit Kids very accessible. That's why we go to the schools. We go to the after school organizations and we give Fit Kids to the kids and their families so they have access 24/7 to our content in their homes. They don't have to go anywhere. They don't need any equipment. They just, they just need access to our content.”

Prescribing Lifestyle Medicine with Anti-Obesity Medications [Podcast Series]

• [:55] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Dr. Jonathan Bonnet

• Dr. Jonathan Bonnet is an Obesity and  Lifestyle Medicine Physician at the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs.  

• Dr. Bonnet is also a Clinical Associate Professor at the Stanford University School of Medicine.

• [1:14] Defining and prescribing lifestyle medicine

• “It’s what you do with your feet, your fork, your fingers, which is physical activity, what you put in your bodies or your diet, nutrition. Fingers is really your substance use and hopefully minimizing your use of risky substances. And then sleep, stress and love are sort of the other three, that sort of round out, really not not just the length of life, but also just the quality of life.” 

• [4:27] Lifestyle medicine tools

• “So part of it is just having a good honest discussion with yourself and with the other person of saying, Where are you at? Where have you been? And what do we think is the right tool to use right now to hopefully get where you want to go?”

• [6:56] Lifestyle medicine and anti-obesity medications

• “Yeah, and another really important point with any of the anti-obesity drugs that we're talking about nowadays, within the package insert, it tells you it should only be prescribed along with diet and exercise or increased physical activity and reduced caloric consumption. So it makes it explicit that it's actually inappropriate to give them without those things.” 

• [10:11] Framing the health benefits of physical activity

• “To me, I think there should be a major shift in what we focus on exercise providing you with in terms of health benefits because there are almost an innumerable number of wonderful things it does for your brain, your body, and virtually every organ system that you have. And I think when people recognize all of the wonderful health benefits they're getting, they realize that exercise really is doing the thing that they want, which is improving their lives.” 

• [13:37] Prioritizing resistance training

• “And so you actually are at risk for starting to utilize muscle for fuel and losing lean mass. And so, the most potent thing we have to do to keep your lean mass around is to resistance train and use your muscles. So, again, I think another important combination of what we really should be sending a message to patients on if you are trying to lose weight, one prioritize your protein intake. But two, you really want to prioritize resistance training so you keep all of the lean mass that you have as you are losing the fat mass.”

• [16:08] Finding health at the gym

• “And so I've still always felt that like the gym was like one of the best places to find health. And so I mean, I've even written some articles about the idea of putting medicine into health clubs and fitness facilities, because I feel like that is where we were actually promoting and creating health, not necessarily in hospitals, where we're trying to save people from not dying, or mitigate disease.”

• [20:30] Reimbursement for exercise services

• “I think this is one of the challenges that I'm sure you've come up with with the PAA, is that typical insurance and payers don't reimburse for exercise services, really outside of things like PT and OT, maybe some exercise testing for like stress testing, or things like that. But it falls off very quickly, where there is this gap where they can go to a personal trainer, if they want to pay out of their pocket, but there's not really a good payer that's going to help foot the bill for them.”

• [23:48] Health & fitness industry opportunity 

• “But I think more importantly, there is going to be a ton of interest from the population as a whole wanting to do this, because three quarters of the United States are basically struggling with being or having overweight or obesity. And so I mean, just think about the number of people that would benefit from the services. So I think again, just really a good time to think about how you can be part of the solution versus trying to fight against it, because it's here, and it's going to be happening, whether you like it or not.”

• [28:03] Size of the health & fitness industry opportunity

• “I think we're going to have a huge audience that really is going to be ready, and hopefully willing and also engaged. I think that's the one thing I really enjoy about my job is that most people who show up to a weight loss clinic, they kind of have the idea that hey, I'm probably going to have to change my diet some and I'm probably going to have to start exercising. So it's almost sort of inferred and implied.”

Mobilizing Passionate Moms to Get Kids Moving Before School [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Kathleen Tullie

• Kathleen Tullie is Founder and CEO of Active Kids Active Minds.

• [1:13] Active Kids Active Minds history and evolution

• “And after reading Dr. Ratey's book, he laid out such compelling evidence on why kids should run around and play before school. So I was with a few other moms and talked about why don't we start a before school physical activity program? I mean, there's so many parents that need to get to work earlier. Kids were designed to move, they're not meant to sit in front of screens all day. And we're doing it right on my front lawn, why not do it at the school and give the school kids an opportunity? It will help the school.  It will help the teachers, the parents, it's just a win-win.”

• [5:17] Power of moms

• “If you are a concerned mom, it is just in your DNA, you will fight to the end to make sure that your child gets what they need. And nobody understands that until they're a mom. And so I think people just started to see that their kids, their kids that had social issues or academic issues or couldn't sleep, that all of a sudden, little Johnny or Jennifer could go run around on the playground, and they were calmer at school and their anxiety was less and their teacher was reporting they could focus on a problem. And we have really engineered physical activity out of our lifestyles. But our brain doesn't know that. And our body doesn't know that. So, I feel like it's going to have to be parents, caregivers, moms and dads that bring back physical activity to kids.” 

• [8:41] The importance of a school champion

• “It does not happen in the US without a school champion. And it can be the janitor, it can be the principal, it can be the superintendent, but you need that consistent voice there. And I'll tell you in school districts where the superintendent is onboard, you see tremendous results.”

• [11:05] Reebok and creating a culture of participants

• “We believe that the sporting goods industry has created a culture of spectators. And we need to reverse that and create a culture of participants. And no better way to start with youth and moms.”

• [13:32] Curriculum and skills development

• “And every week has a skill of the week teaching the kids something, but it starts with a fun warm up, a relay race or some activity that incorporates the movement, whether it's squats or lunges or sit ups, then it goes into a game. We think games are really important because we want to make sure that every kid loves movement. It's not about being an athlete or some famous sports star, it's about just getting out there and enjoying the love of movement and making sure your endorphins are firing and preparing you to take on the day.”

• [17:17] Kids as future consumers

• “Look at it this way. We have, what are the stats? 24% of adults are inactive, but 82% of kids are inactive. So when those 82% of kids become adults and they're the purchaser, they're the purchasing power, they're not going to be focused on sports or movement unless we evolve. Also, there's going to be a lot more mental health and physical problems.” 

• [21:29] Movement addressing learning loss

• “We know that kids absorb more and learn more if they can move. So I just think we have to keep pushing this agenda and make sure that administrators and educators know this. And maybe it's time to redesign our education, reimagine our education, maybe there's stuff that doesn't need to be in the curriculum and schools and teachers don't need to be judged on it. I can't imagine that there would be any case where you would see a classroom that allows the kids to move and play for anywhere from 20 to 60 minutes a day where they're going to have more learning loss.  It's going to actually, all the science shows that they would actually do better.” 

• [26:15] Fighting social media and inactivity

• “You have so many things that are joining forces to actually do a disservice to our kids. So not only were they already physically inactive, but then you combine that with social media and the addiction to social media. And it is really alarming and really scary.”

• [30:37] Active Kids Active Minds future

• “My hope is that we can continue the momentum and that eventually we along with others collaborate and create a movement around bringing back daily PE and PA to schools. That would be my dream is that can we reimagine education and every school day has PE and PA and PE teachers are looked at as just as important and valuable as math, science or English.”

Tailoring Physical Activity Programs for People Taking Anti-obesity Medications [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Dr. Renee Rogers

• Dr. Renee Rogers is Senior Scientist, University of Kansas Medical Center.

• Her focus is on bio-behavioral research.

• [1:37] Bio behavioral research focus

• “And also understand that different people with different medical conditions, perceptions, experiences, all of that is going to come into play. And the way that we build programs, the way that we treat and care for these folks really needs to take both things into account.  Getting overload, getting the dose, but also caring about the person and how they feel.”

• [2:56] Patient-centered approach

• “It's fascinating to hear the responses and to your exact point, what their experiences have been have really framed the way that they're approaching this and maybe some of their decision making as well.”

• [5:05] Anti-obesity medications

• “These medications are working on the eat less side, they are not helping people move more.”

• [9:07] Reframing the health benefits of physical activity independent of weight loss

• “The addition of physical activity isn't necessarily helping you lose more weight, but it is doing other things in terms of the quality of life of the person. And all those independent benefits that you mentioned, Amy, before are really the key crux to helping people connect back with physical activity and doing it for reasons other than weight loss. This is a huge opportunity for us.  The sky's really the limit.”

• [13:31] Patients on anti-obesity medications and physical activity

• “So for us, and when I talk to patients, they tell you that it's important. What they seem to lack in right now is their confidence that it's going to help them. And I think that tells me that's our opportunity, right? That's our opportunity to say, one, can we help build upon their self efficacy for doing this? But really ask, why don't you think physical activity has a role for you right now and understand from them, is it because of past experiences?”

• [17:12] Impact on lean mass

• “I think we want to be careful as practitioners to not say that it's doing something that it's not, which is what worries me when I hear people saying, my resistance training program is going to stop you from losing lean mass on this medication. That's not really a true statement.”

• [22:12] Tailoring exercise programs for individuals taking anti-obesity medications

• “So I think a big, really important first step is to talk to the patient on the medication currently that you're working with to say, I want to know when something changes. If your dose changes, if you start to experience more side effects, I can't directly change any of that that you're going through, but I want you to be able to communicate those things with me because I have the ability to change your program to reflect that.”

• [25:19] Fitness professionals as trusted partners

• “It truly needs to be, I care about your patients and I want to work with you to make their weight loss journey and their quality of life the best that it can possibly be.  And I think that's going to open the door for fitness professionals to be trusted on the team. And once they start to know that they can refer even as a first step, the door is going to open for us to do more and more to advocate for fitness professionals to be on these reimbursement teams.”

• [29:01] Sustainable behavior change

• “So what's better, right to have someone for a long period of time, hopefully their life where they engage in physical activity? What's our goal at the end of the day? Or coming in as hard as you can to get outcomes really fast. It's a balance, right?”

Connecting Collegiate Athletes and Fitness Consumers to Mental Health Resources [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Brendan Sullivan

• Brendan Sullivan is CEO & Founder at ZAMA Health.

• [1:05] ZAMA Health origin story

• “So much of your ability to perform at a high level, whether you're in the fitness community or whether you're an athlete, really comes down to your ability to overcome mental challenges. And some of these are clinical in nature, they can be things from depression or anxiety, but a lot of them are more of like these life stressor events that, if not addressed, do become clinical issues, but still play a role in impacting kind of your ability to work out consistently and perform at this level.” 

• [3:09] Mental health needs in collegiate athletes

• “The main issues that a lot of athletes cite of affecting them from a mental health standpoint aren't necessarily clinical in nature. They're planning for the future, academic concerns, financial worries, and it's related to their sport, but it's not like a pure sport psychology thing, like fear avoidance or something like that. And so I think it's like, how can you actually tailor these types of services so that they're more impactful for our population and not trying to be something that is kind of made for everyone.”

• [5:22] Peer support system

• “There's a lot of things that go on in athletics where your peers can really offer the best insight in a lot of ways and create that sense of support system to help alleviate some of those mental concerns that you have. And so that's again, part of what we're trying to do is facilitate these other modalities besides just the clinical setting for kind of addressing some of these needs.”

• [7:44] Self-guided modules on nutrition, sports, psychology, mental health

• “The onboarding is pretty quick, you're basically selecting kind of your main goals and challenges that you have. And then from there, we start to recommend, initially, self-guided modules. So these are all two to five minute modules that are rooted in financial literacy, nutrition, sports, psychology, mental health, they've all been created by experts in the field.”

• [11:58] Matching peers

• “Now the next iteration of what we're going to do is add more direct messaging forum based things.  We’ll probably include things in the onboarding where now you can actually be matched if you're a football player dealing with anxiety, well we can recommend other football players also kind of dealing with a similar challenge or a soccer player question about transfer portal, same idea. So we want to get more specified and more specific over time. But given as kind of we're younger, it's better to kind of have one really helpful community rather than a million sort of less helpful ones.”

• [13:42] Building online community

• “And so I think at the end of the day you find the most help from a lot of times your peers because you know that you can relate to and connect with them. But when I also say lived experience, I think it also comes down to not even the sport, it comes down to demographics, it comes down to economic backgrounds. And so the more that you can actually connect people that cuts through all those lived experiences, the more helpful, I think, that you're going to find them.”

• [17:19] Supporting collegiate athletes’ mental health

• “So there's new regulations that go into effect next year that the NCAA has put around student athletes. So this is more direct access to clinical care for athletes. It's programming for coaches. It's pre participation screening. It's educational aspects outside of the clinical things around like NIL and financial literacy. So what we're essentially doing in the college side is creating kind of a turnkey software solution to helping them meet all these new requirements.” 

• [18:56] Supporting fitness consumers' mental health

• “We surveyed like 500 gym members, and over 50% of them also met with a therapist. And so like, we know that there's a lot of overlap, and people caring about mental health that also go to the gym, we know, the main reason people go to the gym now is for their mental health and to improve mood.”

• [21:58] Performance and consistency and mental health

• “One is that we can help reduce the need for clinical care by addressing more these kind of life stressor events upstream before they become more clinical issues. But the second thing is that we really wanted to show that we can improve performance. And so much of performance is just tied to consistency, just working out consistently. And so much of that, again, is tied to your ability to overcome or inability to overcome mental health challenges.”

• [25:02] Member engagement and retention and mental health

• “How can we help kind of extend that service that they're providing to really meet people where they are when maybe the physical aspect isn't the primary thing. And so I think oftentimes, when it's not the primary thing, then people are more inclined to quit the gym and leave. But if they also have an outlet to help address kind of these other things impacting them, ideally, that would keep them more engaged, so that they would be less likely to leave is kind of the goal there.”

• [27:27] Training fitness professionals

• “And so that's another thing that we do is we have like a training course for the actual trainers of what are signs and symptoms of maybe someone is struggling with something that requires a higher level of care.”

• [28:53] Integrating healthcare and wellness

• “It seems like there is trying to be a movement to further integrate the two and a lot of it comes to like kind of bringing together experts on both sides and kind of building those relationships.”

• [30:56] ZAMA Health meaning

• “And so at the end of the day, you're kind of trying to develop your best existence, best version of yourself. And so that kind of is where the name stems from.”

Developing Physical Literacy in Kids [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Clare McSweeney

• Clare McSweeney is CEO & Founder at Kuul Play.

• [1:08] Kuul Play origin story

• “And through that I, yeah, I realized how much the landscape had changed, and how much catch up work we have to do to support educators, and particularly children, in moving more, moving better, and enjoying it.”

• [3:17] Addressing decreasing PE minutes

• “If we take in the US, for example, three quarters of states have just basic requirements for PE. And there may be a lack of equipment, resources, time, opportunities in the day to be active. And so, I think if we don't have policies in place where PE is recognized as valuable, an important part of the school day, it's very hard then for even the most well intentioned administrator or educator to be able to deliver that within a very busy schedule.”

• [7:34] Kuul Play platform

• “So we have an easy plug and play solution. It's a digital program that's aligned with the PE standards. And it really supports educators or instructors in a school setting for phys ed or after school in delivering inclusive structured quality physical literacy experiences for K through six students. And fundamentally, we prioritize movement and play time off the screen.”

• [11:39] Inclusive, child-centered approach

• “So the best way, I suppose, that I can explain that is, how do we do it, we support children as a collective to explore movement. And it's fun, and it's enjoyable. And they explore how movement feels, and it builds their confidence and their motivation.”

• [17:11] Educator support

• “All of those educators, all of the instructors that are delivering Kuul Play, they're the true champions, because they are the people that are, yes, we're giving them a resource, we're providing the training and the support before they begin the program—they get professional development—but they are the ones that are at the coalface.”

• [18:57] Boots-on-the-ground perspective on youth physical activity

• “We are definitely seeing less opportunities to be active. If we talk about specifically in the school setting, I alluded to some of the statistics around the amount of PE that's timetabled or scheduled. There is a massive variation.”

• [25:18] Physical literacy development

• “We're looking at empowering a child to become more proficient in moving in time and in space, and manipulating objects like a ball. And then using these movement skills to be able to progress and move better for daily living.” 

• “And when we talk about physical literacy development, really, there's no endpoint or no destination, there's no top score in it, which is quite different to most things in education. So your physical literacy journey is continued throughout life, it's over the life course and you can continually improve.”

Empowering Americans to Lead Physically Active Lives [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guests, Dr. Katrina Piercy and Rachel Fisher

• Dr. Katrina Piercy is Director of Prevention Science, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

• Rachel Fisher is Senior Advisor, President's Council on Sports, Fitness & Nutrition.

• [1:20] Empowering Americans to be physically active

• “And so we see that as a big role to take kind of the science and take that translational piece so that Americans have that information, to be able to hopefully make a healthy life for themselves.”

• “They really help give us advice at the federal government about how to reach these audiences, and to really meet them where they are, and to share messages that empower all Americans.”

• [3:42] Making the science actionable

• “I think that's the challenge with physical activity, is that for a lot of people, they look across the day and it's really hard to think about where it comes in. So we're trying to help people strategize if like, can you put in a few minutes here? Do you have five minutes? Can you multitask with this? Can you stand and do some squats while you're listening to a Zoom meeting?” 

• [6:34] Catalyzing change in physical activity

• “And so how do you break through those barriers and communicate in a way that resonates. And I think, just, that really diverse perspective that they bring, and the platform that they have to kind of be that liaison between the federal government and all of these different populations is a really powerful role that they play.”

• [8:01] Addressing barriers to engineer physical activity back into daily lives

• “I think you hit it spot on that the barriers really vary. And so, and they vary by population, they vary by demographics, they vary by stage of life. And so part of what we tried to do with the Move Your Way communications campaign in developing those resources. So there's currently over 80, in English and Spanish, they're tailored to different audiences. So whether we're talking to parents, we're talking to providers, we're trying to…we do a lot of focus group testing to identify kind of what are the barriers for them?”

• “Recognizing that it really is a whole of society approach to think about these barriers kind of from a systemic approach and how we can really address all of the challenges that we're facing so that we have a more active and healthier nation.”

• [13:47] Linking physical activity and other aspects of health

• “All of our messaging, all of the ways that we tackle this is based on evidence- based strategies and the best science to show that these do, that all of these activities really are critical to our overall health.”

• “And that was also reflected in the White House Conference, which I know some see that as a nutrition heavy conference, but there was five pillars there. And one pillar solely focused on the physical activity piece and kind of that, that combination.”

• [18:38] Taking a unified approach through partnerships and collaboration

• “ And so part of our role is to kind of help partner and connect with other organizations within the communities that are closer to working with individuals that might be working to make some of these changes.”

• “This really needs a unified approach to address many of these challenges, and to help share these really important scientifically based messages to resonate with a variety of sectors and populations. And so partnerships are integral to being successful.”

• [21:33] Getting kids moving

• “So if we can set kids up for success when they're young and help them to develop these kind of a lifelong passion themselves and healthy habits, we'll all be better off as a nation.”

• “I just see such a tremendous potential to kind of normalize physical activity as a part of the routine so that kids are just, this is what we do.”

Training Youth Sports Coaches, Officials and Directors [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, John Engh

• John Engh is Executive Director of the National Alliance for Youth Sports.

• [1:06] National Alliance for Youth Sports history

• “And so we started back in 1981 as an organization with the idea that there were all these moms and dads out there coaching youth sports for their kids in a recreational setting. So when we talk about our coaches, we're all out of school sports and, like I said, moms and dads who volunteer their time, not only coaching, but on boards serving and running recreation activities for kids, and for every sport out there. And the idea was that they're looking for—in some cases looking for it, in other cases needing—training or retraining on what it means to be a youth sport coach.”

• [4:08] Training volunteer coaches

• “So that's kind of our job is to educate them. Let the parents understand who they're dealing with. Let the coach understand what the parents’ expectations are so that when you do start to coach you can actually do the coaching and have a, have a great experience. And of course make it the best that it possibly can for the kids. So I think that's what's so appealing about what we do.”

• [9:56] Safety training

• “Understanding concussion awareness and the symptoms, to a sudden cardiac arrest, to just the understanding of the use of an AED, what an AED even looks like and where it might be located, basic CPR, those kinds of things are easy now to understand. But they can be overwhelming if you put them all into one big package. So we kind of lay that out, so that you understand that.”

• [14:50] Positive coaching

• “And your philosophy is that whole positive outlook and making it fun for all the kids. And people think, ‘Oh, fun. Everyone says fun. That sounds like it's not sports. It's not competitive’. Well, guess what? That's not true. Competition for many kids is what is fun, okay? But you have to get the competition done the right way to make it fun. Or it can be the opposite, right?”

• [20:04] Respecting players and officials

• “You're right about the officials thing, too. And it's because parents are, they're entitled that way that they feel like and I really do feel like it ties into this idea of how sports are as a whole in, especially in our country but…actually that's a worldwide phenomenon, I think, the way that fans act. And so fans are fans. And if you're watching a game, it doesn't matter who you're watching, this is how you're supposed to act, and this is how people are supposed to deal with officials…”

• [22:52] Youth sports and mental health training

• “Well, all these organizations have team psychologists, they have people that are talking to their athletes, and they couldn't have been more willing to help us out with this. I mean, everybody said yes. So it was great. It was almost like we were talking about earlier, having too much content is better than not having enough content. And then we got some really quality stuff.”

• [26:56] Coaches responsibility around mental health

• “It's not just a privilege, but it is a big responsibility to understand that you're going to send that child home or you have the opportunity to send that child home much better off emotionally than they were when they got there.”

• [30:20] Access to free trainings

• “Yeah, so anybody that wants to look at the mental health training can go to nays.org, you do have to do a very simple registration, which is just your name and your email address, and you can sign up for any of our free trainings. You do not have to be a member, you don't have to go through any of the others. And you can see all the different resources that we have on our site.”

U.S. Report Card on Physical Activity for Children and Youth [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Dr. Peter Katzmarzyk

• Dr. Peter Katzmarzyk is Professor at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center at Louisiana State University. 

• He was Committee Chair of the 2022 U.S. Report Card Research Advisory Committee.

• [1:15] Report card history

• “And, as you mentioned, in 2014, that was the first kind of international global matrix, we called it, of report cards. And that's where the U.S. jumped in with our first 2014 report card of physical activity for children and youth.”

• [2:18] Comparing the U.S. with other countries

• “In terms of the actual infrastructure for physical activity, we do fairly well when we're stacked up against other countries. However, where we kind of fall down is on the actual behaviors themselves. So when we actually measure physical activity in the children or sedentary behavior, active transportation, it becomes apparent that we're not taking advantage of that physical activity infrastructure. And we're not really maximizing those opportunities.” 

• [5:10] Active transportation

• “So those sorts of things where people are no longer living adjacent to their schools. And many kids don't have kind of community schools in their neighborhoods. We don't. And so there's all this going on in society, which has really, I think, changed that way of life.”

• [7:44] Behind the scenes perspective

• “This is just a volunteer committee, where we have a series of meetings over a year—it takes about a year to put this thing together—where we first identify the indicators that we want to provide grades for—physical activity, sedentary behavior, active transportation, organized sport participation.”

• [10:48] Ten indicators

• “Well, there is still cause for concern with the low numbers of children who are physically active and participating in physical activity. But there are a few bright spots, really, and I think we have these opportunities that will allow us to help move the needle here. So, of course, we get a D- for overall physical activity, which has remained constant over time. Really, it's about one in five kids are meeting the physical activity guidelines.” 

• [14:32] Taking action on youth physical inactivity

• “I think, because we have this report card that highlights the issues, then it comes around to the partnerships, with the Physical Activity Alliance, and all those organizations that are part of that, because they've really stepped up. And when we released the report card, we released the data and the report card, but then it's the partners that can really take action.” 

• [18:03] Sedentary behavior

• “And sedentary behavior has been one of our key indicators over time. And what we really noticed this time, which you just alluded to, was screens are changing,  the way that the kids interact with screens is changing the way they get their sedentary behavior. So we have a lot of recommendations in the report card this time about changing our surveillance efforts around that…”

• [21:15] COVID-19 pandemic

• “The physical activity research community didn't just kind of go home and sit in their quarantine. They were working and they were working hard during COVID. So I was really impressed with what they came up with.”

• [23:25] Chronic and infectious disease and physical activity

• “But now we really understand the importance of physical activity in the prevention of infectious disease. And not only its prevention, but prevention of complications.”

• [24:58] Active play and family and peers

• “As I mentioned, we have these core indicators and we kind of add and subtract to that. We have had a couple of them that have been there for a while that we've never been able to address.  We've had to give an incomplete grade to a couple of these. One is active play, which is extremely important in our minds. And the other one is family and peers, and family and peers has been there forever. But we've never been able to give a grade.” 

• [26:20] Moving the dial on youth physical inactivity

• “By the opportunity, it's much bigger than that, it's by having that programming there and attracting the kids there, and the parents with them to be physically active. And so we need to continue to create those opportunities and to make it easier to be active. And I think the more we do that, the better off we'll be.”

Impacting Community Health with Lifestyle Medicine Centers [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Dr. Brad Roy

• Dr. Brad Roy is Executive Director of Logan Health Medical Fitness Center. 

• He is also Editor-in-Chief of the American College of Sports Medicine Health & Fitness Journal.

• [1:13] Logan Health Medical Fitness Center programming and services

• “We're a 115,000 square foot medically integrated fitness center. So by that we have physical therapy, occupational therapy, cardiac and pulmonary rehab, and our physical medicine and rehabilitation clinic, all of those hospital based programs are in the facility. Along with clinical programs that we run through the fitness portion, our Journey to Wellness program, which is a health coaching based program…”

• [3:20] Community focus

• “S,o yes, we have that broad perspective that we feel as a medically integrated fitness center that's our role is to try to help people of all ages of all conditions, and to find strategies to reach out beyond our doors to people that are out there that would never join a facility or they can't. How can we get them moving?”

• [5:12] Measuring the impact on community health

• “But just looking at different opportunities to know your community, be out there speaking, be part of community groups, be active in the schools. We're very tight with our physician communities. We have a lot of referrals coming in that way as well. All those things help us to reach out beyond the doors of the facility, to our greater community.”

• [8:04] A health coaching approach

• “That’s why we take a health coaching approach to everything. It's not about what we want them to do, but it's about meeting them where they're at, and then helping them to discover where they could go, and how to get there.”

• [10:46] Journey to Wellness program

• “So it's a three month program.  It is health and wellness coaching based.  They have an initial visit where we do some basic biometric and questionnaire types of assessments that we repeat at the end of the 12 months. And we do have some 12 month data out of that. And then they all receive health coaching during that period of time.”

• [12:14] Measuring health outcomes

• “I think the beginning is what's the story you're trying to tell? What's the message you're trying to put out there? It is easy to measure too much. And that's a caution that I, I throw out there, because the scientists in all of us, we want to collect just about everything. And then you end up with too much information.  You can probably tell a story that's really not true.  You can skew the data really easily. So I think you have to have a clear objective for what you're trying to accomplish with those measurements. And then that will lead into what you need to measure.” 

• [14:43] Stories and statistics

• “All of that is important so that you have good data to work with to tell your story.”

• [16:22] Medically integrated fitness centers as lifestyle medicine centers

• “So really a medically integrated fitness center is a lifestyle medicine center. And I really believe, I personally believe that that's where the focus needs to be. And that's where the industry needs to be moving.”

• [22:16] Health coaching approach to youth development

• “So I think that type of an approach resonates with people and meets them where they're at. We're not telling them what to do. We're helping them to discover where they want to go.”

• [24:50] Youth sports and skill development

• “And really that's what youth sports is all about. So often the focus is on winning, right? It really needs to be skill development. I want my grandkids playing every sport because then they just become a well rounded athlete. And maybe later in life, they apply that to hiking or other recreational types of things that they do.” 

• [26:36] EHRs supporting physical activity assessment, prescription and referral

• “The data is there.  Liz Joy and Intermountain Health. Bob Sallis, with his whole program. There's tons of data out there that shows the benefit of that, and the lower cost of care of those that are physically active versus those that aren’t. So it's like a no brainer, we should be doing this.” 

Addressing Time, Tools, Training, Technology and Trust in Healthcare Integration [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Grace McNamara

• Grace McNamara is CEO of Exercise Intelligence. 

• She is also Co-Founder of RISE - Females in Fitness Collective. 

• [1:07] Exercise Intelligence definition

• “So we pull together all of that science, that exercise science, and then we layer in as many of behavioral methodologies and supports as we can. Because at the end of the day, the science is great and we have it, but unless it's implemented, it's useless, right? So it's all about how do we get people to incentivize people to actually move and be physically active and share that with their health and health support structures?”

• [7:28] Exercise Intelligence platform

• “But we’ve got to go back to that personalization. I think what's important then is the way we build a platform is that's the science behind us. There's a data portal that your professional can see. And then there's the app that is fairly simple for that end user and that member of what do I need to do today? What do I need to do this week? Right. So it's, and again, it goes back to the global standards that we have, ideally getting people up to 150 minutes of moderate activity a week, but we start off really slow. So we start off in maybe 10 minutes, low intensity three days a week, it might just be there. And it builds up gradually over time to get you to that 150 and then hopefully maintain you at 150.”

• [14:16] Addressing trust in healthcare integration 

• “Trust, first of all I’ll address because it sounds the most important, right? And I think we've had this for decades as we've said before, clinicians necessarily don't trust fitness professionals because there isn’t the same level of standards, there isn't the same level of verification of who's qualified and what's safe, and so on. So for one thing is, we've gone down the regulated route, like any other technology in the healthcare and the medical world, the same way.” 

• [21:57] Fitness professionals using the platform

• “So again, hopefully adding trust and credibility for that end user who may or may not know what exercise has, is going to do for them and may or may not also trust the fitness and industry sector. So it's trying to build a trust in all angles, right, with healthcare professionals, with the fitness professional and with the person who's going to be the one accessing the support and being more physically active.”

• [25:40] Closing the feedback loop with technology

• “So with consent, all that data is centralized into one place and then we can send that, share it back to that to that professional, seamlessly. So, and that's really important. If we're going to ask somebody to be physically active and we're going to reward them for being physically active, we need something that's going to track all day activity and wearables do that. So we have the technology.”

• [28:05] Window of opportunity for healthcare integration

• “I think it's the urgency. I don't think there's any country or system in the world who doesn't feel the urgency of we've got to do something quick.  All our trends are still going in the wrong direction. So I think it's the urgency, I think we have the digital transformation words been pushed around for years. And we're not necessarily seeing the ROI in some spaces. And the urgency is now. We don't have the opportunity to look at another 10 years of incremental changes, we have an urgency that we have to see exponential change now.”

Tracking Health Outcomes to Build Trust with Physicians and Participants [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, David Flench

• David Flench is President and CEO of the Medical Fitness Association. 

• He was previously Director of Wellness Centers and Diabetes Education at Hancock Regional Hospital.  

• [1:12] Medical fitness pathway

• “And all the while I was very involved with the Medical Fitness Association, and whether it was committees or I ended up getting on the board of directors and becoming the chairman of the board. And then, then that all culminated when the former CEO of MFA retired, and I jumped at that opportunity. So it was really, I think, lots of opportunities through MFA, lots of networking that led me down the entire path that I just walked you through for my medical fitness career.”

• [6:32] Medical and commercial fitness differences

• “One of the key aspects is tracking the outcomes for participants and for the program as a whole. Because really making sure that what you're doing is working for these people. That's important, not only for the individual themselves to be seeing those types of results and hearing those types of outcomes, but it's important for the physicians, the medical community who's referring into these programs to know what’s happening.” 

• [11:12] Medical fitness strategic priorities

• “You can't have all the great mission based services without them being financially sustainable. But, we tracked KPIs for customer service and quality and employee satisfaction, retention, community impact. So, so, really, strategy was important to address all of those areas.”

• [14:15] Medical fitness staffing

• “One thing that I'll say about medical fitness centers that I've always believed for the staffing is, if you're using the medical fitness model and you're employing folks with degrees, that really, they went to school for this, and they want to make a career out of this, this is their profession. Then you're getting sometimes a little bit higher quality. And those people are, are usually, they're more apt to stay a little longer term. So the turnover is probably a little bit less than your traditional commercial fitness centers.”

• [17:25] Collaborative care team

• “In my career, it was always very important to bring together the care team. And so whether you're talking about those within the same facility, so oftentimes for me that was physical therapists, that was diabetes educators, sometimes nurses and others, even physicians that were within the same physical structure, but then even throughout the entire healthcare system…”

• [22:10] MFA certification

• “It helped financial performance for my facility.  And I think that ultimately boiled down to the differentiation that the MFA’s facility certification created for us. And so that differentiation, we were able to show that and talk to people, physicians, other health care providers who were referring to us, just the general public even.  I think it really created a level of trust and that understanding of what we do and how we can help.”

• [26:32] Medical fitness opportunities

• “I think the opportunity then lies in being able to be that resource for those people and so differentiating and saying, we have these programs, and we have these, these, these staff that are going to create these outcomes that are going to be really beneficial.”

Communicating Science to Impact Health & Fitness Business Profitability and Consumer Behavior [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Dr. Rachelle Reed

• Dr. Rachelle Reed is Chief Health and Science Officer for SweatHouz, a recovery focused wellness franchise.  

• She was previously with Orangetheory Fitness as their Senior Director of Health Science and Research. 

• [1:13] Academia pathway

• “And so we did a lot of validation work, and then also a lot of work looking at, alright, when someone starts a physical activity program, how does that change their behaviors throughout the rest of the day? Like do they have any compensatory responses? What's happening there when we track the behaviors? What does that look like over time?”

• [5:15] Industry pathway

• “So how do we talk about exercise in a way that the everyday consumer cares about it, that we can make it accessible, that we can make it fun, so they actually show up. And so that was really interesting to me. And I knew that was something I wanted to do in a full time capacity, but it also wasn't like there were roles that really existed at the time, so I knew I was gonna have to figure out a way to make myself marketable to learn the language of business and start to carve out roles for myself.” 

• [10:46] Communicating science to impact business profitability and consumer behavior

• “And so for me it required a quick mindset shift into how can I help use the science to either improve the product or service or to make the instructors more skilled and/or to help drive the sales process so that we can get more people in the door and keep them for longer? Because if we can keep them for longer, the business is more profitable and they're hopefully earning some of those health benefits that are associated with regular exercise.”

• [15:37] Fitness sector as the third space

• “Do we want everyone to have barbells and dumbbells in their garage and do progressively overloading resistance training programs? Sure. But do a lot of people rely on the fitness sector to be their third place where they show up and participate in a group activity that not only improves them physically and mentally, but also socially, emotionally, all of these other aspects?”

• [19:01] Using data to drive programming and adherence decisions

• “So we could use the data to better drive programming and adherence decisions. Because the brand was really well aware that if we could get someone in the door and keep them coming about two times per week, they were more likely to stick with us for months and years than if the workout was too difficult and alienated them right away.”

• [22:31] Tips for communicating science to consumers

• “And so when we're messaging to the consumer, we have to take that into account.  It needs to be simple. It's usually short snippets of information, right? They don't, maybe they don't want to listen to an hour long lecture about physical activity, which I'd be happy to give them if they did, but they don't they want 20 seconds, right with something that feels genuine, fun, and trustworthy.”

• [25:34] Examples of communicating science to consumers

• “Their mission and vision right now is all around this concept of more life. So how does what you're doing in the studio and in their workout templates, how does that translate to what you do out of the studio? So they have a whole visual campaign, for example of someone doing like a woodchopper movement with a dumbbell. And then in the next frame, it's that same gentleman picking up his two-year-old daughter with that same movement.”

• [28:30] Tips for communicating science to operators

• “Yeah, so I think the main thing with communicating science to the operators is helping them understand how science can improve the profitability of the business and/or how well their studio managers and studio staff, whether that's coaches, trainers, part time, full time, etc, how that can better equip them to serve the member better.”

Preventive Health as a Business Model [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Pete Moore

• Pete Moore is Founder of Integrity Square and host of HALO Talks.  

• He is also the author of Time to Win Again.

• [1:26] Health Active Lifestyle Outdoor (HALO) Sector

• “We came up with this term HALO—Health Active Lifestyle Outdoors—and what we're trying to do is actually redefine the sector. So if there's a company that has a better-for-you food or beverage, if it is a connected fitness company, if it's a sneaker business, if it's a pickleball company—which I was just at the US Open in pickleball. All these companies are not really in their own category. But there's really an umbrella of trying to help people get better, take self action, and live a healthier lifestyle, which we know what the prescription is for that.”

• [3:30] Health & fitness industry meeting the needs of people with obesity

• “I think, maybe, the fitness industry in general might have lost some of the narrative related to how to solve some of the problems here. We've interviewed several people that are deconditioned and overweight, and they said, Look, you know, I go into a health club, and they try and sell me something. They also try and put me into a challenge that I'm not comfortable getting into. And I really just want to lose 20 to 30 pounds. And I want you to show me a fun, exciting and easy path to do that. So I think a lot of people are still shunned from going into health clubs because they're intimidated.”

• [8:02] Health & fitness industry meeting the needs of older adults

• “And you should not any more feel intimidated by going into a health club because they are catering to you. And they do care. And the entry point on the price is very low. And it's probably also part of your insurance policy.”

• [13:04] Thinking outside the walls of a health club

• “I think there's work that needs to be done on health clubs, in general, to think outside the four walls of their clubs. So there's been a lot of workouts that have been done by trainers in parks during COVID that I think is a natural extension of the health club.”

• [18:00] Public-private partnerships

• “[F]rom a standpoint of municipalities, I think they're doing overall a pretty good job of adding pickleball courts, adding walking lanes, adding bike lanes. Those things are very important. Maybe it needs to go a step further, maybe there needs to be free bike rentals in the parks, maybe there needs to be, bring back roller skates and rollerblades.”

• [23:57] Preventive health as a business model

• “And look, at the end of the day, health insurance companies need to realize that preventive health is actually a business model. Prescriptive health is not a long term sustainable business model. We can't afford to have 10-year old kids that have type two diabetes.  One, that's completely unacceptable from protecting your neighbor, if you want to go back to the 10 commandments, if you will. We need to take care of people, and we need to make sure that they're not marketed to unnecessarily, and we also need to make things accessible and affordable.”

• [27:32] Outdoor physical activity

• “So everything that you're doing with ACE, everything that people are doing by just setting up a 30 minute workout in a park. Those things matter, and they multiply, and it's exponential. And there's gonna be an aha moment for a lot of people in that community. And once those people see results, which they inevitably will, by moving just 30 to 60 minutes a day, it has a peer pressure positivity to it…” 

• [28:53] Innovation in the sector

• “This whole industry of HALO is based on friendship.  It’s based on solving loneliness, looking out for other people. And it starts with picking somebody up and taking them for a walk. And then let's go from there.”

Why Sports Matter [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Dr. Ethan Scheiner

• Dr. Ethan Scheiner is author of Freedom to Win: A Cold War Story of the Courageous Hockey Team that Fought the Soviets for the Soul of Their People.  

• He is a Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Davis.

• [1:18] Story inspiration

• “I thought it would be fun to teach a class on politics and sports because I think, ultimately, sports actually plays a really big part in the way human beings interact and all sorts of important parts of politics.”

• [8:43] Why sports matter

• “A big one is just simply inspiration in a way that we often kind of forget about but, I mean, there are very few things that inspire us the way, inspire masses of people the way that sports do.”

• [12:50] The freedom to win at sports

• “So I talked to Martina Navratilova for this book. And she had this incredible line. She actually led to the title of the book. She said, the hockey, the hockey games went beyond sports, they gave people hope. And she said, ultimately, whether they won these games, that was going to help uncover whether they still had, and these are her words, the freedom to win, which is totally incredible and I immediately stole it and made it the title of the book.”

• [19:06] Martina Navratilova and freedom

• “You could just get a sense of how much the people there were  hankering or hungering for freedom in the way that they cheered for Martina as she came back. And it's an incredible story.”

• [20:33] Parents as coaches and critics

• “it was horrifying that this father was saying this. But this kid was so proud that he had his picture in the newspaper and the father is like, ah, no big deal. You can tell me you know something when you've won the world championship.”

• [21:58] Conditioning and the key to sporting success

• “And the Soviet coaches actually took a very different view, which was, all humans are basically the same.  Some of us are a little bit more talented than others. But, in the end, since all humans are basically the same, the key to sporting success is: one, you come up with really good strategies and tactics for games; and two, you just train more than everybody else, and you get way better in shape.”

• [27:06] Writing the hockey scenes

• “These matches meant so much to the people of the Czech Republic and Czechoslovakia and Slovakia. They still watch these matches and they still play them on…so Czech TV replayed these matches and got the key figures involved. And so the key figures did commentary during the game.  So they then talked about what they were thinking during the game.  And then I could put in the book, well, this person was thinking and feeling this at that moment, and so I could really talk about the emotion of the moment.”

Unifying the Health & Physical Activity Sector Worldwide [Podcast Series]

• [:54] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Amy Boone Thompson

• Amy Boone Thompson is the owner and CEO of IDEA Health & Fitness Association. 

• Amy is also an advisory board member for the California Fitness Alliance, and the Vice Chair for World Active.

• [1:29] Health & fitness industry background

• “One year ago, I bought IDEA Health & Fitness. I was running the company. I saw an opportunity to bring it out of private equity and carve it back out and run the association. And so I one day jumped out of my chair and said it's me, it's always been me this was my path all along, although I never knew it. And today, I'm the owner of the association.

• [4:11] Advocating for fitness professionals

• “I knew that I had a gift that if I showed up authentically, I could continue to help the user create impact and advocate for these fitness professionals. And that's really what led me to that burning desire to jump out of my chair and say, It's me, it's always been me, let me buy this company. Because it was all perfectly aligned with my mission.”

• [9:05] Leaning into soft skills

• “I truly care for the person in front of me, whether they're my employee or whether they're my boss, or whether it's, it's a member of the club or the business. And when you lead from that place and that space and that intention, then things fall into place. And you do need to lean into soft skills to, to be human and, and have that empathy...”

• [10:57] IDEA Health & Fitness Association evolution

• “And that's really where we're going to be best as an industry. If we can come together and stop segmenting the business into so many categories and so many roles and so many shows. My vision is to reconnect our ecosystem so that we can truly unite.”

• [13:27] Needs of fitness professionals and operators

• “But a lot of professionals have found that fitness exists outside of four walls. And fitness can exist anywhere.  And as a professional I have more choices than ever to meet clients where they are and I can have my career where I want it. So I think that's really exciting. Now to address the need of club operators, they're gonna have to be, give a more compelling offering of what's in it for the professional because the—if you want to call it power—it's kind of shifted again.”

• [16:31] Professionalization of the sector

• “So I think we have an obligation first as an industry to reset what our entry level requirements are. And I don't mean that they necessarily need to change. I mean, we all need to be on the same page about what it means to work in our industry and to carry the title of personal trainer or group instructor. Stop making up new titles. Stop trying to reinvent this. Let's go back to just agree what is the minimum competency that someone needs to have to work in our sector?”

• [19:10] Movement for all

• “Movement for all is one of my core values. And so that applies to our professionals as well as it applies to the end user.”

• [19:59] Setting the terminology

• “So I think one of the primary objectives of World Active—which is a newly formed collaboration of associations and registries—is we've got to agree, in order to unify our sector, we have to agree on some terminology that we identify with globally.”

• [22:40] World Active objectives

• “But the whole goal is to create an organization that can represent our sector when it comes to having these conversations about our place in prevention and in the healthcare ecosystem. So we have goals such as standards and credentials, and we have goals around equity and inclusion.”

• [25:22] Collaborating on research and data

• “We will be talking and collaborating and you know, research and data is going to be a big piece of this initiative as well. And that's where we need to look to all the great work that's been being done on every continent and collaborating those efforts.”

• [26:32] Call to action

• ​​”What's the data that you need in order to be better operators? What are we missing that can help to make us more collaborative? How can you lean into all the information that we can share to create more equity in our services that we provide?”

• [27:55] Unifying the sector

• “I keep using the word unify. But it really hasn't been a collaborative, unified industry ever since I've been in this space, and I've been in for over 30 years. Something is happening. And there's a shift right now where we're coming together.”

Optimizing Your Joy Potential Through Movement, Dance and Play [Podcast Series]

• [:55] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Dr. Elaine O’Brien

• Dr. Elaine O’Brien is the author of The Power of Play: Optimize Your Joy Potential.

• She is a long-time dance fitness instructor. 

• [1:18] Positive psychology

• “The science of positive psychology is around flourishing, well-being and happiness. So we can look at happiness as enjoyment, and also as having meaning in our lives. So it's a more balanced approach to traditional psychology, because it's looking at maybe the bright side—optimism and our character strengths, and what makes life worth living.”

• [2:22] Dance fitness and flow

• “So I think that through the rhythmic movement that is challenging, complex, but also can be easy to follow over time, that movement with a group of people provides communitas and that we become bigger as a group than we are as an individual. So that also encourages that lifting up that forgetting, you know, where we are in time and space, and it makes time stand still but also go fast at the same time when we're in flow.”

• [4:32] Influence of dance fitness background

• “And I could see changes, profound changes in myself over teaching, as you said, like the brain power, I feel like I got smarter over decades of teaching dance fitness. But in my students, I could see this connection to their bodies and their movement and each other. So it's really interesting to me to be able to try and connect people to each other and build a positive community.”

• [11:12] Dance fitness instructors helping others

• “Dance fitness instructors, they have a lot of magic in terms of the ability to lift people up, out, you know, you never know what people are going through. And if you can provide a bright light and then encourage people to move and feel great. That was one of my goals is to help people leave feeling great, to leave the class feeling great, wanting more. And one of my theories is around using, trying to use your healthy body to help yourself and then to help others, as we move through the lifespan and the healthspan.”

• [13:02] Movement and play

• “I think those are just a couple of ways to play.  Anything that involves creativity and just sparks some well-being and goodness, I think can really be considered play.”

• [15:40] Play and joy

• “[N]ot exercising is like taking a depressant, I think that not playing, similarly, is just, it makes us not live our full potential, the possibility of the joy that we can really harness and, and, again, evoke and just that other people can experience and then also feel.”

• [17:32] Play and well-being

• “[W]hen we have those positive emotions that we evoke through movement a lot of times and play generally, it really helps us broaden and build our repertoire of emotions. It boosts our learning, it boosts our well-being in the world, again, and just like canjust spiral up and up and up to really good feelings.”

• [20:25] The science of play

• “Then there's the biochemical things, right?, the dopamine that we get when we're playing, the brain derived neurotrophic factor, we can just really connect with people on a bigger level. We have a saying, let joy be your magnet.  So if you can prime joy in your day, every day, it just helps you to really live your life more fully, more vibrantly. And I think going through the years, that's a real protective factor for you in terms of helping you to be more resilient…”

• [24:26] The downsides of not playing

• “Oh, I think that developing a play mindset is really important, right?, being open to the possibilities and thinking of things that you might have enjoyed doing as a child and that you could do now. When you don't play, it can make you cranky.  It can really impact your health negatively. It can make you not as attractive, because if you're being cranky, that's going to reflect and people aren't going to want to really hang out with you. I think it stifles, again, creativity...”

• [26:16] Finding flow while writing

• “So, again, to close those [phone and computer] down and to get out and get a nice breath of fresh air, walk around the block, whatever you can do, because that'll change up the energy.”

Brain Healthy Exercise Prescription [Podcast Series]

• [:55] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Ryan Glatt

• Ryan Glatt is Senior Brain Health Coach and Director of FitBrain at Pacific Neuroscience Institute Foundation.

• [1:09] Brain health coaching

• “First to define a health coach is, there's many ways of defining it, but my favorite definition is a certified professional—ideally a board certified professional—that has skillful conversations to help people accomplish their health-related goals. A brain health coach is exactly the same thing with a focus and specialty in brain health-related goals.”

• [1:53] Specialization in brain health

• “Anyone who could be a health coach can, I think, learn about neuroscience in an evidence-based manner and be able to address an individual's brain health goals. The more chronic conditions and specialties you get into of course, the more considerations have to be there. So learning about things like polypharmacy and medication management just like an exercise physiologist or a medical exercise specialist might, working in tandem with physical therapists and allied health care professionals and specifically in my area neuro psychologists, neurologists, psychiatrists, psychologists, anyone that is adjacent to or interested in brain health or care therein, I'm typically working with.” 

• [5:01] Reason for specializing in brain health

• “But there is just something about helping people with their brain health where if I was training older adults before, yes, it's very impactful to train them to be able to play with their grandkids. But for me, it was even more impactful to help them remember their grandkids’ names.”

• [6:15] Dual tasking

• “But dual tasking has been researched—specifically dual task interventions, dual task training interventions—to be helpful in anywhere from certain aspects of cognition like executive functions or attention or processing speed, to things like balance, especially in older adults and especially in individuals with chronic neurological conditions like Parkinson's and MS.”

• [9:23] Brain healthy exercise prescription

• “And often what I find in order to get towards a what we call a brain healthy exercise prescription, whether that's an individual who wants to prevent dementia, an individual with mild cognitive impairment or a person with Parkinson's disease, the prescription is that 150 to 300 minutes moderate to vigorous physical activity minimum per week, but also adding some variety. So you want some aerobic, you want some resistance training and you also want neuromotor.”

• [11:53] Evidence base linking exercise and brain health

• “And so depending on the type of exercise, whether it's acute or a chronic intervention, the exact type of exercise prescription, these different mechanisms will vary.  But the micro, macro and behavioral levels of the brain are all different levels in which exercise can affect the brain.”

• [15:31] Whole body of evidence

• “I find it necessary to summarize as much of this as possible because people will post something on LinkedIn like ‘See, exercise is good for the brain because of blood flow. I told you.’  It's like, that's just one piece of the puzzle. And it's quite complicated. It's not easy, and we still haven't figured it all out yet.”

• [16:25] Health & fitness industry trends

• “I think fads and trends can be a gateway drug to actually understanding science better. And maybe it could be a nice way for you to understand and address biases. But it's also a nice way to focus in on a particular area.”

• [17:19] Scientific accuracy

• “And I think what's happening now is there's a lot of fitness professionals with not good scientific literacy or no training in neuroscience or formal experience, and preaching about these benefits in a way that is very biased and often very much incorrect.  And I think that's one of the dangers, as a fitness industry, the fitness industry can't comment on neuroscience without neuroscience professionals being in the fitness industry.”

• [22:15] Referral networks for linking brain health and exercise

• “As a professional in the brain health sphere, a health and fitness professional, it's important to know about all these different types of professionals, respecting scope of practice, humbling yourself before them and not trying to be the person that does everything….”

• [25:32] Achieving optimal brain health

• “Yeah, well, a lot of people say if someone's teaching something, they look to their own lifestyle to see if they're practicing it to decide if that person is credible or not. And by that definition, I'm not credible at all, because I'm struggling with my own brain health and lifestyle practices every day.” 

• [27:46] Role modeling

• “But I think the fitness industry, by focusing on body composition, has become excessively judgmental. And I have had so many people who are in excellent shape that are really struggling with their brain health because they may be active, but maybe they are not focusing on sleep, or maybe they don't have the right exercise plan, or it's just exercise or eating disorder that's been masked by this societal expectation.” 

• [29:16] Developing a scientific literacy skill set

• “I do think that scientific literacy is one of the skill sets that we as personal trainers and health and fitness professionals need to develop. And I think people when they hear that, are like scientific literacy, it really doesn't take that long to learn. But it does, it's a lifetime of refinement. And it's just what it represents is constantly checking your biases and paying attention to details, which I think is critical for everyone for everything in some ways.”

Walkable Cities Where Walking is the Useful, Safe, Comfortable and Interesting Choice [Podcast Series]

• [:55] Dr. Bantham introduces her guest, Jeff Speck

• Jeff Speck is a city planner.  

• He is the author of several books including Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America One Step at a Time.

• [1:10] Urban design and walkability

• “But it took me many years of doing this work to realize that actually good urban design is designed for walking, and all the things that walking supports and that support walking. And that actually if you use walking as both kind of the measure of the success of a place, but also develop a series of strategies around making walking more possible, more likely, more effective, more instrumental in our lives, then you make better places.”

• [5:34] Supporting the choice to walk or bike

• “How do you create an environment in which people are making the choice to walk or bike, in fact, rather than to drive? And the answer is that the walk has to be as good as the drive. And for the walk to be as good as the drive. It needs to do four things simultaneously. It needs to be useful, safe, comfortable, and interesting. So we look at the factors that contribute to each of those four things. And we try to improve them.”

• [7:04] Walkability and longevity

• “And they basically said, the reason why we have the first generation of Americans are expected to live shorter lives than their parents is because we've engineered out of existence the useful walk in our communities. You know, bad diet is one thing, but inactivity is just as important. Maybe more important.”

• [10:58] Walkability and COVID

• “What the epidemiological studies showed was that the reason that people in cities were surviving COVID better was because they were healthier because they walked more.  And it was almost like the epidemiologists were my, like I had coached them, because they basically boiled it all down to walkability and said, it would be a bad idea for people to leave walkable places and move to unwalkable places because they're going to end up out of shape and more likely to die from COVID.”

• [14:44] Walkability and quality of life

• “You're not going to have the big yard, you're not going to have the big home typically, but you have access to so many public facilities, right, that the density floats, that can make it a much better quality of life.”

• [17:57] Walkability and schools

• “School location and size has a huge impact on the kid’s health and ability to learn and the way that you get to school really predisposes you towards being a better or worse learner.”

• [22:36] Bike infrastructure

• “The one thing that has changed the most is that finally in 2023, we've made normal, at least in the progressive cities, we've made normal bike infrastructure that was normal in Berlin in 1995. So it took us, it took us almost 30 years.”

• [25:36] Bikeability and health benefits

• “But if your city can give you a safe route, maybe not 100% safe, but a generally a non-treacherous route to and from your work. And you have the opportunity to bike on it. Of course, the risk you face from injury is real. But it's dwarfed by the benefits that you get to your health from being fit and active.”