August – National Wellness Month

August is National Wellness Month.  It’s time to take this opportunity to help your patients improve their overall physical and mental health.

In these often-stressful times in which we live, wellness is more important than ever. We all need to learn what we can control and what we cannot…and then control what we can!  We are all in charge of our own minds and bodies.  An endocrinologist who was an important mentor of mine asked me once, “Think of your 80-, 90-, or 100-year old patients.  Think of all the people you’ve met in your life that lived to be that old.  Now tell me, how many are morbidly obese?”  That question stopped me in my tracks.  He was right - I couldn’t name one. Not a single one. Wellness is so incredibly important if we want to spend long, enjoyable lives with our loved ones.

“Wellness” isn’t just a euphemism for “Exercise and lose weight, you couch potato!”  Not at all.  Wellness is primarily being in good physical health as well as being in a state good mental health.  The two are intricately linked and trouble with one often causes trouble in the other. By the same token, improving one, often helps the other. There has been much research published that supports the fact that the better you feel physically, the better you’ll feel mentally – and the happier you’ll be.

When it comes to your patients, if you’re helping them care for their feet, you’re indeed helping to improve their overall wellness.  Of course, getting them set up in a great pair of Dr. Comfort® walking is a solid start (For women, the Refresh, Spirit, Grace and Diane are great choices.  For the gentlemen, the Gordon, Endurance, Performance and Winner are just some of our excellent walking shoes styles.) But maybe there is even more you can be doing.

Have you thought about hosting, facilitating, or sponsoring a diabetes support group?  Your local Certified Diabetes Educator can be a great resource to help get this off the ground (https://www.diabeteseducator.org/living-with-diabetes/find-an-education-program).   Maybe your company could start a weekly walking group at the local park for your patients or even for the community at large. How about hosting monthly fun educational meetings at your store?  Perhaps you could sponsor some healthy cooking classes?

You are a member of the diabetic foot care team, but don’t ever forget that you’re caring for the patient attached to those feet!

The contents of this blog were independently prepared and are for informational purposes only. The opinions expressed herein are those of the author and are not necessarily indicative of the views of any other party. Individual results may vary depending on a variety of patient-specific attributes and related factors.