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VANCE AIR FORCE BASE, Okla. With health and well-being of airmen in mind, the Air Force has set strict fitness standards for active duty and Reserve members.

Each airman must pass a physical fitness test consisting of aerobic, muscular and body composition elements.

For the aerobic element, airmen must complete a timed 1.5 mile run; for the muscular element, they must do as many push-ups and sit-ups as possible in separate, one-minute periods; and for body composition, they must have the circumference of their abdomens measured. All components must be done in a three-hour window.

Standards for passing the 100-point test are based on age and gender, with age groups broken into 10-year increments. In most circumstances, tests are administered annually. Scores of 90 and above are excellent, 75 to 89.99 satisfactory and less than 75 unsatisfactory.

If they score a 90 or better, its yearly, if its less than a 90 it is every six months, said Kellie Jensen, fitness program coordinator at Vance Air Force Base Bradley Fitness and Sports Center.

To help airmen pass their fitness tests, as well as to promote healthy lifestyles, the Vance fitness center offers a wide variety of programs.

We have educational classes, we have incentive programs, we have group exercise classes that are actually designated as fitness improvement program classes, which means they are sufficient enough to help you prepare for a PT test, said Jensen.

Among the classes offered are strength training, spinning, yoga, PiYo, Zumba and Turbo Kick. A natural running clinic also is offered.

Its all gait analysis, said Jensen. We look at their running form and try to offer corrections and show them what good running form should look like.

Jensen and Joel Urdang, health promotions program coordinator at Vance, offer a running class consisting of their top 10 tips for runners.

Its not necessarily intervention for a failed PT test, said Urdang. That could be somebody who is doing great on their PT test but they say, Let me see if theres something in that top 10 that I could add to my toolbox.

Jensen also develops individual workout plans for airmen.

Beginning each January the fitness center offers a program called Soar Into Shape, which focuses on helping participants develop healthy lifestyles.Soar into Shape participants are awarded points for meeting weight goals of losing, gaining or maintaining weight, healthy eating routines and regular exercise.

If an airman fails the PT test, his or her commander can order specific interventions, said Urdang, depending on where help is needed. If an airman fails the run portion, Jensen will meet with them for a cardio intervention, while there will be a strength intervention if they fail the push-up/sit-up part of the exam. If the airmans waist circumference does not measure up, Urdang will perform a healthy weight intervention.

Theres also another option, although we encourage commanders never to make it the only option, said Urdang. Theres online training that can be included as one of the interventions for a failed PT test.

If smoking is a factor in a failed fitness test, Urdang will meet with the airman and discuss the tobacco-cessation program he directs.

They cant require someone to quit smoking, but they can encourage them to explore it because maybe they failed their run time, Urdangsaid.Most of the work that I do from the health promotions side is more lifestyle change, getting people to think about reducing some of their risky behaviors related to lifestyle-related diseases.

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Vance fitness center is a key in ensuring airmen measure up - Enid News & Eagle

Fox17

Exercise class participants hold each other accountable at Lakeshore Fitness Center Fox17 One of the best ways to make sure you get to the gym is by having someone hold you accountable to go. At Lakeshore Fitness Center at Muskegon Community College, they have a big array of group exercise programs that are popular for the whole family!

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Exercise class participants hold each other accountable at Lakeshore Fitness Center - Fox17

Expert weighs in on effectiveness of... More Headlines

MADISON, Wis. - The fitness industry is a big business, bringing in an estimated $24.4 billion annually. One in five Americans have a paid gym membership at one of the more than 37,000 gyms nationwide. But with so many choices, picking a type of workout can be intimidating. One of the hottest workout trends is high-intensity interval training, or HIIT.

Many gyms offer some form of HIIT training, but atOrangetheoryfranchises, HIITtraining is all they do. Students at the fitness centersendure an hour-long workout while wearing heart monitors and following a trainer's instructions. The program involves treadmills, rowers and weights.

Adrian Lee, a former strength coach and a graduate of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is the head trainer for both Madison Orangetheory Fitness studios. Hesaid HIITis based around anaerobic and aerobic exercise and centered on heart rate.

"The idea is we spend time in our anaerobic zone, which for us is the orange and red zone combined," Lee said. "You'll get something called EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen), which occurs in the next 24-36 hours."

At Orangethory, heart rate, calories burned and time spent in five different heart zones are shown on big monitors. The zones are color-coded, with orange being the ideal zone, which gave the company its name.

"It's just a really good gauge, it's also a big motivator for a lot of members, so if they see they're truly working to their capacity by looking at the heart monitor, then as coaches it helps us because we know whether to pull a member back a little bit, not over-train or hurt themselves over time or to push them a little bit more to get to that next level," Lee said.

Laura Zeller, an exercise physiologist with UW's Preventive Cardiology program, has recommended HIIT training to some of her heart patients.

"In general, exercise gives you an opportunity to burn calories after exercise, but high-intensity interval training is more likely to burn more calories," she said. "In general, the higher the intensity of the workout, the more calories you're going to burn afterwards."

Exactly how many calories are spent in the afterburn is open to debate, but experts agree there is some positive post-workout effect.

"We know that high-intensity interval training can result in faster fitness gains and overall higher fitness level," Zeller said.

Most people will benefit from HIIT, but people with heart disease should check with their doctor before starting an intense training program, Zeller said.

"It's never too late," she said. "I have some amazing (people) who have been starting their exercise programs who are in their 80s and 90s who are just doing very well."

Experts also recommend leaving at least 24 hours betweenHIITsessions.

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Expert weighs in on effectiveness of 'high-intensity interval training' - Channel3000.com - WISC-TV3

Last months volume of the Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment included aresearch that explored the benefit of physical exercise in addiction treatment.

Exercise has been proven to be a great treatment for not only depression and anxiety, but also for panic disorder and major depression, said Jeremiah Weinstock, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of Psychology at St. Louis University and lead author of the research article. So, I think exercise just goes after some of those underlying problems that people with addiction struggle with.

Weinstocks research described a new exercise intervention to address barriers encountered by people struggling with substance use disorders (SUDs) as they aim to start and maintain physical activity programs that meet public health guidelines.

Current guidelines state that adults need a minimum of 2 hours and 30 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity a week to experience significant health benefits. Reduced depression, prevention of weight gain and improved muscular strength are among the many benefits associated with daily moderate-intensity exercise usually described as an intensity level in which a person is capable of talking, but not singing.

The positive effects of daily exercise are not only well-known but are proven to be particularly significant for people struggling with mental or behavioral disorders, yet exercise is often not a part of their lives.

A two-front approach

After years of extensive experience researching the rationale of physical exercise in the treatment of drug addiction, Weinstock drafted the intervention included in his research to be a fusion of specific intrinsic and extrinsic motivators or in his words, a combination of motivational interviewing with contingency management.

Motivational interviewing is an approach that aims to enhance a persons drive and eliminate uncertainties toward change. Contingency management is a form of behavioral treatment in which monetary or tangible compensations are provided when specific goals are met.

According to Weinstock, closely-monitored financial rewards have been shown to help people with SUDs start exercise programs because financial struggles are often reported by patients as obstacles to regular exercise. And motivational interviewing was added to the intervention because multiple studies have demonstrated its positive impacts when used as a separate approach or as a part of larger addiction treatment intervention.

We used a two-front approach, he said. Extrinsic motivation helps people start new things, so we offered gift certificates for people who started the exercise program. Then we really focused on intrinsic motivation because once those extrinsic motivators are gone, what keeps people going and sticking to exercise is intrinsic motivation, to get something out of it that internally just makes them feel really good.

Students drink less when they exercise more

Hoping that by promoting a specific (positive) behavior, another (negative) behavior would change, Weinstock led a randomized clinical trial in December with 70 heavy-drinking, sedentary college students from the University of Connecticut.

Again, Weinstocks tactic was to mix motivational interviewing with contingency management.

The students participated in (continue reading)

Summary

Article Name

Making physical exercise work in addiction treatment

Description

Last months volume of the Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment included a research that explored the benefit of physical exercise in addiction treatment.

Author

Livia Areas-Holmblad

Publisher Name

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Making physical exercise work in addiction treatment - Addiction Now

Exercise is a word most people despise. It constantly reminds them how physical weak they are. Another reason that there arent any constant changes. It takes lots and lots of work. Combine the two, and you have people absolutely hating every second of a workout. As it turns out, habitual physical activity can have positive effects spill over the workplace.

According to death statistics from 2015 compiled by the CDC, the leading causes in the United States are heart disease, cancer, and chronic lower respiratory diseases. Collectively, these diseases killed 1,353,148 Americans that year.

A recent study shows that we can help employees reduce their risk of heart disease by implementing a wellness program. The U.S. government recommends employees get at least 2.5 hours a week of moderate aerobic activity or 1.5 hours of vigorous activity to reduce rates of heart disease.

The positive effects of promoting fitness at work are far too many. According to a 2005 study performed by health professor Jim McKenna of Leeds Metropolitan University, a good workout can cause an overall work performance boost of about 15 percent. Moreover, Harvard researchers noted that post-workout flow creates the optimal conditions for performing tasks that require cognitive thinking.

The link between fitness and the performance of simple cognitive tasks was first suggested by studies in the 1960s. In the 1990s, a cognitive psychologist at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology at the University of Illinoispublished a paper in Nature showing that previously sedentary adults who took an aerobic fitness plan for six months boosted their performance in cognitive drills that required executive control. This kind of executive control helps you to switch between different tasks without making errors. It is also a key contributor to a complex set of processes like attention, working memory, decision making, planning, temporal integration and set shifting.

The effects of physical activity extend beyond cognitive skill training. "There's good epidemiological data to suggest that active people are less depressed than inactive people. And people who were active and stopped tend to be more depressed than those who maintain or initiate an exercise program," says James Blumenthal, PhD, a clinical psychologist at Duke University.

In a study conducted by Blumenthal and his colleagues: sedentary adults with major depressive disorder who reported regular exercise had lower depression scores a year later than their less active counterparts.

People who exercise on a regular basis, prone to anxiety are less likely to panic when they experience fight-or-flight sensations. This is because the body produces many of the same physical reactions. The reactions are increased heart rate and heavy perspiration, in response to exercise.

Moreover, exercise also helps reduce stress and help you gain better nights sleep. A study published in the Journal of Sport and Exercise Psychology found that endorphin-boosting, heart-pumping workouts promote happiness.

Habitual physical activity is directly associated with stress resilience. According to a study by Princeton University, it reorganizes the brain so its response to stress is reduced and anxiety is less likely to interfere with normal brain function.

Unfortunately, it takes months before any physical results of the physical workout are apparent. But, at the end of the day, its all about tuning into a mental state after exercise. Thats why your favorite employee perk should be an addition of a wellness program.

employee wellness programsfitness at workinvesting in employee wellness

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2 Reasons It's A Good Idea To Participate in Wellness Programs - TheHRDigest

Saint Marys Fitness Center is launching a new eight-week cancer wellness program this month called everyBODY can.

everyBODY can came up as an idea to kick start a healthy lifestyle, Cassie Goodman, medical exercise supervisor at Saint Marys Fitness Center, said.

Goodman explained that Saint Marys Fitness Center has run a cancer rehab program for more than five years now. Many of their cancer survivors, particularly women who have had breast cancer, are trying to lose weight and to reduce the risk for reoccurrence by exercising. However, to be successful members need to focus not only on exercise but also on eating well and living a healthy lifestyle.

They are getting super focused on the exercise part and they are missing that nutrition and self-care component, Goodman said.

In order to focus on all aspects of wellness, the fitness center is launching everyBODY can. The program includes team workshops with health coaches and nutritionists along with weekly group exercise classes and more.

everyBODY can is set up as a competition where participants can earn points in the three areas of exercise, nutrition and self-care. The grand prize winner will receive a spa certificate, hotel room and dinner provided by the Peppermill Resort Hotel along with a shopping spree. However, Goodman said they are implementing a cap on the amount of points a participant can earn for exercising so that they do not over exercise to win the competition.

The idea is sustainable change, Goodman said. We dont want people to go all gung-ho for eight weeks and not be able to maintain it afterward.

everyBODY can runs from Feb. 13 till April 7. People interested in the program should sign-up prior to Wednesday, Feb. 15. The program costs $45 for Saint Marys Fitness Center members and $179 for non-members, which includes a membership to the fitness center during the eight weeks in addition to the program itself. Scholarship opportunities are available and the program is open to all cancer survivors in the Reno-Sparks area.

It is open to men and women with all types of cancer at any stage of treatment as long as their doctor signs off on it, Goodman said.

They already had 17 people sign-up for the program a week out from the launch. Goodman hopes to make everyBODY can a reoccurring program.

We have been getting a lot of support from the community, Goodman said.

Saint Marys Fitness Center is owned by Saint Marys Health Network. However, the facility is not limited to just Saint Marys patients.

For a regular membership anyone can walk in, have a tour and sign-up just like a regular gym, Goodman said.

The fitness center is open Monday through Friday from 5 a.m. to 10 p.m. and Saturday and Sunday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. It is located at 645 N. Arlington Ave. Suite 100.

The Saint Marys Fitness Center employs nearly 80 people including 15-20 personal trainers. The center has nearly 4,000 members with the average age of their members being 54-years-old. Since the fitness center offers medical-based exercise programs in addition to traditional fitness programs, it provides a safe environment to improve their health at any fitness level.

We really try to keep it a non-intimidating place, Goodman said.

For more information about the Fitness Center, visit http://www.saintmarysfitness.com. To learn more about the everyBODY can program or to sign up, contact Cassie Goodman at 775-770-7874 or email her at Cgoodman2@primehealthcare.com.

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Saint Mary's Fitness Center launches cancer wellness program - Northern Nevada Business Weekly

BRANFORD >> Picture this: Eight roughly Medicare-aged men and women, scattered around a dance studio, all wearing boxing gloves, jabbing at punching bags and shouting out the count of how many punches theyve thrown. One man is throwing punches at the unsurprisingly lithe trainer, Terry OHara, and she is shouting, Jab cross, jab cross, jab kick. (The kick is shouted fortissimo.)

The man delivers a swift kick in the direction of OHaras mitt, and she smiles and says, Good.

Whats happening here is an exercise class for people with Parkinsons disease, the progressive neurological disease that results in muscle weakness, stiffness, poor balance, a shuffling gait. Some lose their voices, some have severe tremors. There is, at this time, no cure.

No cure, but some programs that give hope for slowing the progress of the disease. Beat Parkinsons Disease Today, a for-profit organization, is the name of the boxing/exercise program with classes in nine towns (including Branford and Old Saybrook) that was founded and designed by Michelle Hespeler of Marlborough. She has special understanding she was diagnosed with Young Parkinsons Disease 10 years ago when she was 40. A former physical education teacher, she started doing research and focused, she says, on balance, posture and gait and movements that you use every day, like picking something up...You have to exaggerate movements to compensate for slowness.

Boxing, she finds, is good for balance, and also valuable because it uses both the left and right brain. Youre doing two things at the same time....Also it gets frustrations out.

Participants clearly like the boxing part of the exercise classes. Joann Hogan of Madison, after a bout sending punches to a partner (cross punch, jab, cross, hook hook hook), called it strenuous but invigorating.

Allyson Kinney, of Branford, is an avid exerciser/boxer she attends two classes a week the one at the dance studio, Studio One in Branford, and another at Branford High School. She was diagnosed two and a half years ago, at age 69. She has noticed her voice getting softer and softer...You have to practice speaking loud so you dont lose your voice. Like her fellow boxers, shes a believer in the program It jolts the muscles, it helps with rigidity, she says. She exercises daily, and believes exercise is what keeps the symptoms at bay.

Kinney, who was a computer-science teacher for almost 40 years, is the leader of a Parkinsons support group that meets once a month in Branford for a program of speakers and sharing time when Parkinsons patients can meet and share, while families or friends meet separately. The speakers are varied a physician who specializes in Parkinsons, a state legislator who is interested in fund raising to finance research. (Attendance at the meetings, which began with 20 people a little more than a year ago, now averages 40 to 50.) The support groups are organized under the umbrella of Connecticut Advocates for Parkinsons (CAP), a nonprofit also founded by Hespeler and her husband.

Support groups, exercise classes that get people who would normally be past boxing age moving (and punching and kicking) are giving PD patients hope. Kinney says, Im very optimistic about myself because Im taking charge. Im being pro-active. Im not going to sit around and let Parkinsons beat me. Im going to do everything I can to stave off symptoms. So far Ive done a good job.

For further information, see the website http://www.beatpdtoday.com or call 860-463-3747.

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Beat Parkinson's boxing program in Branford helps ease symptoms ... - Shoreline Times

Rest days are a standard part of exercise programs, but theyre not the only way to avoid overworking yourself. Lets look at the difference between rest and recovery, and when you can bend the rules.

Most strength-focused programs like weightlifting either work your whole body and then skip the next day, or else they have you split up your workouts so that, for example, your arms get a rest on leg day. The idea is to let each muscle recover from a workout before you ask it to do the same thing again.

But not every activity works this way. Runners, for example, often run every day, and may only take one or two true rest days a week. But within that pattern, they will alternate days of hard running (like speedwork, hill running, or long runs) with easy runs that feel less challenging to the body.

Other sports may fall somewhere in between, but nobody expects to work every body part to exhaustion every day. Even when elite athletes do workouts every day that look killer to us, its because our hard is their easy. You can bet their coaches schedule in just enough of the easier workouts to keep the athletes progress on track with minimal risk of injury.

Rest days and splits help us to pace ourselves. Too much hard running, if youre not used to it, sets you up for tendonitis and other overuse injuries. And too much exercise of any kind can lead to a syndrome called overtraining where your body may develop flu-like symptoms and disturbed sleep because it just cant keep up with the demands youre putting on it.

Taking a single rest day after a hard workout isnt the only way to keep yourself from overtraining. There are a few reasons its a good rule of thumb, though:

If you can accomplish those goals with another schedule, though, feel free to do so. If you enjoy all your workouts, even the hard ones, slowly include more hard days in your schedule. If you feel okay with that, keep doing it! But if you end up sore or fatigued, listen to your body and put those rest days back in.

If soreness is your problem, be aware that skipping one day may not be the best way to deal with it. Soreness peaking at 48 hours is just an average, and the true timeframe can vary. Your muscles might only feel sore and weak for one day, or if you tried something new and difficult, you might feel it for a week. At the beginning of a new workout routine, you might even need three or four easy days.

Some people prefer the term recovery to rest days, because total rest isnt necessarily your goal. After all, lifting a fork to your mouth is a similar action to a bicep curl, so if you just did a heavy arm day, would you be unable to eat? Clearly, some amount of activity is fine on a rest or recovery day.

This is where you have to calibrate your own sense of effort. If youre new to exercising and you just did a day of heavy squats, a five mile bike ride is probably not a great choice for the following day. But if you bike five miles to work every day, you should be able to keep doing that even on your rest days.

When I did push-ups every day for 30 days, a few people suggested that I was setting myself up for injury by not taking rest days. But as I wrote in that article, I ramped up my fitness very carefully. A few sets of pushups every day is my new normal, and its no more taxing to me than a bike ride is to a bike commuter. Some days I might try a more challenging type of pushup or I might do more reps than usual; but I balance out those harder days with, you guessed it, easier days that are closer to my baseline effort level.

As you learn your own strengths and limitations, you too can alter your workout schedule according to what works for you. That might mean you only take one or two rest days per week, or it might mean you do mega-hard workouts and then lay low for a few days. If youre getting a reasonable amount of exercise in total, and if you arent getting sore or injured, youre probably doing okay.

Illustration by Jim Cooke.

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Do You Really Need a Rest Day After Exercise? - Lifehacker

Details Published: 15 February 2017 Written by Asher Kohn - Staff Writer/asherk@latc.com

Megan V. Winslow/Town Crier Students in the El Camino YMCA EnhanceFitness class undergo their exercise regimen.

In the El Camino YMCAs EnhanceFitness classes, students ages 60 and up get their exercise whether they use a wheelchair or not. On one recent Tuesday, a handful of students braved the storm to visit the Y and boost their heart rates.

This low-impact class is for individuals who want to start out or enhance their fitness levels, said the instructor, who wished to remain anonymous. Its great having it at the Y because were a community. Its more than just a gym everyone interacts with one another.

EnhanceFitness evolved from a University of Washington study launched in 1993 that revealed fitness not only improved physical functioning in seniors, but also allayed depression and improved social functioning. The El Camino YMCA has offered the program since 2013, in four-month sessions that enable instructors to track their students results.

While EnhanceFitness classes are also conducted at El Camino Hospital and Villa Siena Senior Living Community, the instructor said teaching at the YMCA is different.

Every time I walk through the doors, I feel happy, she said. Its great to see the whole spectrum of ages.

The wide range means that the seniors can teach life lessons to younger YMCA instructors as well. Including how to talk back. The instructor remembers one instance where a 100-year-old student did not want to follow the rules.

We try to encourage students to drink water, but this woman didnt want to, the instructor said. When I asked why, she looked at me and said, I would rather go home and drink my brandy.

Lisa Schouten, wellness coach at the YMCA, works with patients after their discharge from local hospitals. She pointed to two programs Parkinsons Exercise Program and Health Transitions that take people from not just the community, but from the hospital bed, and try to help them avoid a second visit.

The Parkinsons Exercise Program is a free course that gives students the opportunity to participate in spinning classes, interval and dumbbell training, as well as Drums Alive, a class in which students drum on stability balls.

This is supposed to be great for brain health, Schouten said of the varied offerings.

She added that exercise helps students improve cognition.

Stanford sends a lot of people to us. The Parkinsons Institute is well aware of what we do and sends us a lot of people as well, Shouten said.

Shouten said many YMCA members are also support-group leads for members of the community with Parkinsons.

The Health Transitions program is slightly different. According to Schouten, the complimentary three-month program affiliated with El Camino Hospital helps with pulmonary and cardiac (lungs and heart) rehabilitation.

Hopefully, they can join the Y and their joining fee is waived, she said.

Health Transitions started in 2012 with only cardiac patients but has since expanded. There are now approximately 30 participants spread through three levels of the program and Schouten oversees all of them.

As theyre finishing their (hospital) rehab, theyre told that there is a Y program where someone will help you, she said. I get, for lack of a better word, a prescription telling me what their heart rate should be and how hard they should be exercising, so I can fill out what their needs are.

The relationship enables her to send information back to El Camino Hospital about how the students are progressing. Hospital staff periodically follow up with their former patients, charting their improvement.

Schouten, for her part, said relationships with trusted institutions brings people into the YMCA.

About half continue a relationship with the Y, she said. Because many of them are older folks, theyll bring a spouse in with them.

Schouten encourages it not from a bottom-line perspective, but because it means the students can be more committed to exercise.

A lot of the ladies say, You know, my husband needs this more than I do. I encourage that, because it is so much easier to exercise with somebody than on your own, she said.

For more information, visit ymcasv.org/elcamino.

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YMCA proves a quiet ally in lifelong health for all ages - Los Altos Town Crier

Photo: Chris Marquette / Hearst Connecticut Media

Jay Jaronko, senior program director at the Westport Weston YMCA.

Jay Jaronko, senior program director at the Westport Weston YMCA.

Jay Jaronko, senior program director at the Westport Weston YMCA.

Jay Jaronko, senior program director at the Westport Weston YMCA.

Get to know...Jay Jaronko, senior program director at the Westport Weston YMCA

WESTPORT At a YMCA professional development training session early in his career, Jay Jaronko realized the limitless potential and impact program directors, like him, can have.

A guy my age, in my role, invented basketball. (James Naismith) was the sports and fitness director at a YMCA college, Jaronko said. The message was, not only can you do things like this, but we want you to do things like this. We want you to take a look at the community youre working in and we want you to change things for the better and that really jazzed me up. It really spoke to me.

Despite growing up next to a YMCA in his hometown Southington, Jaronko did not consider working there until his friend urged Jaronko to take a summer job as a YMCA camp counselor while he was home from the University of Connecticut, a job he continued each summer until he graduated with a history degree.

Still uncertain of his path following graduation, Jaronko took a job at the Southington-Chesire YMCA as a youth program director where he was in charge of all youth sports and ran an after-school program. His time there was transformative, particularly, his team-building program for middle schoolers. The fifth-graders who were set to enter the two local middle schools in Southington gathered on separate days for a friendship building session.

The students were guided through discussions on understanding cultural competency, minimizing risky behavior and promoting tolerance. One of the groups of students, when they finished that sixth-grade year, came back for another team building exercise this time with their teachers.

When this group came back, the sixth-grade teachers came in and they said, This is the best group of sixth-graders weve ever met. They just gelled in a way weve never seen before, Jaronko said.

Id like to think that the goal was met, but that just blew me away, he added.

Since he moved over to the Westport Weston Family YMCA in 2013, Jaronko, the senior program director, has been instrumental in bringing special-needs programs to the Y, among other initiatives.

In its first year, the program had 57 youth athletes compete in basketball tournaments and swimming competitions. Now, swimming takes place year round, there are two seasons of basketball and Jaronko is looking to add track and field this coming year.

We started the Special Olympics programs in January of 2016. Thats been a passion project this year of mine, he said. Its been a runaway success at this point.

Another significant program added in 2016 was a blood pressure self-monitoring service. The four-month program teaches participants to monitor their blood pressure, increase their exercise, improve their diet and, ultimately, lower their blood pressure.

Weve currently got about 80 people enrolled in the program throughout Westport and Bridgeport, Jaronko said. Were getting into chronic disease management and prevention programs at the Y. The phrase is we want to bridge the gap between the house and the hospital. So what were trying to do is help people manage their health so they dont need to end up needing to go to the hospital.

Jaronko added that the blood pressure prevention program is one of many to come. Diabetes prevention, Livestrong a cancer survivor program and arthritis exercise programs are some of the ideas in the pipeline.

@chrismmarquette; cmarquette@bcnnew.com

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Get to know...Jay Jaronko, senior program director at the Westport Weston YMCA - Westport News

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