I say hospitals I mean nurses and doctors really. I have recently had cause to be in hospital for a few nights. This has meant among many other things having my blood pressure and pulse taken on average every 2 hours and I mean EVERY 2 hours. Whether it's 2am or 4am it's every 2 hours. Sometimes I don't think I was even awake when they did it.
I'm used to having my blood pressure and pulse taken in hospitals. I have twice yearly diabetes check ups that involve this. Every time it's taken there's an alert on the machine as my pulse is low. Now I'm no Miguel Indurain but my resting pulse is in the low 40's. If I'm watching to it will be around 48-50, reading in bed around 44 or so and on waking around 38-42. All very low.
In hospital it appears that the machine alerts sub 60bpm. It alerted every time they took my readings and with multiple nurses on different shifts I had to explain every time that "I am pretty fit", that I "run a lot". Still it was met with some sideways looks and on a couple of times was called out to the consultant. The consultant who knew and understood my background and was not concerned.
Looking around me in hospital on the various wards and it occurred to me that I was in a very distinct minority. Not being overweight, it appeared, was quite unique. But I was still in hospital in spite of being pretty fit.
As an observation it seems if you're overweight you are more likely to be in hospital this is based purely on what I saw. Also if you are unfit you are maybe more likely to be in hospital, this is based on the fact that all the nurses were surprised by a low heart rate. None of this is news, "overweight person in hospital" is not a headline you're going to see anytime soon as it's not a shock.
I started to think that it's quite sad that healthcare professionals in the main are dealing with the unhealthy. There were people I was with that you have to wonder whether once their immediate issues are resolved that they will not be back there with either a recurrence or new health issue.
Get fit, lose weight and give our healthcare professionals some healthy inspiring people to work with!
