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Personal Prescription Paper

Personal Prescription Paper

Tiffany N. Kinchen
Pasadena City College
January 31, 2016

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Personal Prescription Paper

Following a lifestyle self-assessment that reviews the Wellness and Dimensions of Health
I was made aware that my physical and environmental health were poor and that my social health
could use improvement, but not necessarily a concern that needed immediate attention.
According to the scoring system of the physical portion of the health assessment I need to
increase my participation in physical activity in regards to type of activity, frequency and
duration. The fact is, exercise in general is not a part of my daily/weekly routine. Another part of
my physical assessment that is poor is my inability to get 7 to 8 hours of sleep per night. From
my experience as a nurse I know that sleep can affect weight, mood/ behavior and increase
susceptibility of chronic ailments when chronically deprived of sleep or maintaining a nonnocturnal sleeping pattern. My physical health assessment was my second lowest score of my
health assessment, with my primary low score being environmental health. At this point in time, I
feel that my current immediate focus need to be emphasized on my physical health with a goal to
improve it and then goals to maintain it.
Ways to improve my physical health has been an ongoing process throughout the years
that has required me to make several reassessments and adaptations as my physical ability, time
and resources have changed over that course of time. Currently, and with the help of this course
and resources used for this course, I have been able to make small changes to help me on my
journey to better physical health. Time has always been scarce between long commutes to work,
school, a 12 day work schedule and my obligations to my family; therefore time for exercise was
not a prime concern. When my children were younger it was easier to fit exercise in because I
was able to exercise through play with the children in trips to the park, bike riding, and roller
skating or swimming with them. In an online news article titled 9 Time Hacks if Youre Too
Busy to Exercise (Pagoto, 2015), I have discovered ways to make time for exercise by using

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Personal Prescription Paper

my breaks at work to blend in 10 to 15 minutes of walking outside or stretching into my day. The
article even suggests to use my days off of work for longer periods of exercising to be able to
meet my goal of 150 minutes of per week. I have also installed the SparkPeople application on
my mobile phone to assist me with my weight loss goals, the application will document and
calculate my caloric intake, daily food consumption, activity and weight. Due to osteoarthritis
combined with a high Body Mass Index (BMI) of 35.8 categorizing me as obese, I have
restrictions of only low impact/ non-weight bearing during exercise per my physician. Weight
loss would, at some point, decrease that restriction and allow me to exercise more and in various
ways without causing injury to my joints. Being able to exercise more would actually benefit my
discomforts from the arthritis, as it would increase my range of motion and help build muscle
(Skerrett, 2013).
It is important to sustain a healthy lifestyle to improve your quality of life, increase your life
expectancy and decrease opportunities for chronic ailments. Of course there are some instances
of health where lifestyle may not have necessarily contributed to someones unfortunate health,
like congenital diseases, hereditary diseases and degenerative diseases such as Multiple
Sclerosis, Huntingtons disease and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS). However, in a
majority of chronic ailments, our lifestyle contributes directly to our health similar to how
smoking increases your likelihood of becoming afflicted with COPD, lung cancer and
cerebrovascular disease. Upholding a healthy lifestyle means abstaining from or decreasing
activities that are considered unhealthy behaviors such as sedentary lifestyle, smoking, alcohol
consumption, high fat and sodium diets, drug use, unprotected high risk sexual conduct, , sleep
deprivation and unmanaged stress. Nourishing a healthy lifestyle also affects those around us,
like our immediate family members. The mother that is eating healthy and exercising is also

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Personal Prescription Paper

cooking healthy for her family and is showing her children and spouse that health and exercise is
a priority; thus promoting good health.
I have three personal goals for the next four weeks to improve having a healthy lifestyle that I
can commit to and is obtainable. The first goal is to become more active and partake in brisk
walking no less than 150 minutes per week which will include five 15 minute walks five times
per week Monday through Friday and 40 minute walks on Saturday and Sunday. I hope to be
able to also supplement my walks with other activities that I enjoy like roller skating and
bowling as time allows to break up the monotony of walking everyday as well as make
exercising an enjoyable activity. The second goal will be to monitor my caloric intake using my
SparkPeople application, consistently logging my food consumption in the journal and not
exceed what is allotted to me; which will hopefully also help me make better food choices and
support my efforts in weight loss along with the exercising. My third goal will be to set a realistic
time at night to be in bed at the end of each day so that sleeping 7 to 8 hours a night can become
a habit, and compliment my effort of becoming healthier. I believe that limiting my current goals
to just three will enhance my attempts to achieve my goals successfully thus creating habits that
will permit me to continue successfully.
In conclusion, having and maintaining a healthy lifestyle is beneficial to the quality of life and
quantity of life a person will have. Assessing and reassessing yourself within the wellness and
dimensions of health model will be a continuous process to ensure that you are sustaining a
healthy standard of living. Once assessment is complete and variances are acknowledged you can
begin to set realistic goals to achieve balance again.

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Personal Prescription Paper

References
Donatelle, R (2015). Health The Basics. San Francisco, CA: Benjamin
Cummings.
Harvard Health Publications Harvard Medical School (2013) Exercise is Good,
Not Bad, for Arthritis [Web Page] Retrieved from
http://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/exercise-is-good-not-bad-for-arthritis201305086202
Pagoto, S. (2015, March 23) 9 Time Hacks If Youre Too Busy to Exercise
[News Blog Post] Retrieved from http://health.usnews.com/healthnews/blogs/eat-run/2015/03/23/9-time-hacks-if-youre-too-busy-to-exercise