THIS week, during dinner, I found myself doing a surgical hand washing technique demo. Obviously my teenage sons found this excruciating but nonetheless sneaked sideway glances at what I was doing. There are good hand-washing videos on YouTube that demonstrate better hand-washing techniques if you haven’t already seen them.
One thing that is noticeable when treating patients is how when someone's general health improves so does their mouth health and also their success after surgical treatments.
For example, there are some patients with gum disease who have the traditional dental treatments and their gums improve significantly but not totally. It's only when they improve their overall health that it tips the mouth into optimum health.
It could be someone who is a diabetic with poor control over their blood sugars and when they really address this by losing weight or improving their diet it has a knock on effect on the stability of their blood sugars and thus their gum health improves even more.
What’s happening at a cellular level in our body really does make a difference and the body reacts fast even to minor lifestyle changes. Twenty minutes after the last cigarette is smoked, your heart rate drops and returns to normal, blood pressure begins to drop and circulation may start to improve. In as little as one month, a person’s lung function begins to improve.
So, looking at a positive side to the coronavirus situation, it could give us the stimulus to improve our health and boost our immune systems. Increasing our fitness, improving our diet and getting more sleep will give our bodies the best chance of fighting off viruses.
Even low-intensity exercise naturally lowers cortisol levels and helps with immune-system function so small amounts of exercise have an impact.
Initially, during exercise, the number of some immune cells in the bloodstream can increase dramatically by up to 10 times, especially the 'natural killer cells’, the white blood cells, which deal with infections and which help flush bacteria out of the lungs and airways.
So I’m off to do circuits in my first floor living room and hope the downstairs ceiling doesn’t fall in again.
