Base Body Babes full-body barbell workout

Get stronger, fitter and feel more confident in the gym with this exclusive full-body workout by the Base Body Babes.

"The barbell is our favourite piece of training equipment, as it can be used for such a great range of exercises. We like to say that ‘Load is King’ – the exercise that allows you to lift the heaviest loads will ultimately give you the best results, and the barbell allows you to do just that. Although there is no magical number, we love the eight rep range as it allows you to build strength while still keeping the heart rate elevated for optimal calorie burn," says the ladies, Felicia Oreb and Diana Johnson.

 

Here's what you need to do

• A1 Barbell Back Squat
• A2 Barbell Military Press
• A3 Barbell Romanian Deadlift
• A4 Barbell Bent-Over Row
• A5 Barbell Split Squat
• A6 Barbell Glute Bridges

 

Perform each exercise A1–A6 back to back, with no rest in between exercises

• Complete 8 repetitions of each exercise
• Rest for 4 minutes after A6
• Repeat 4–6 times

NOTE: Choose weights that you believe you can complete all repetitions and sets with without failing, yet still keep the weight challenging enough to complete a great workout. Technique is most important when lifting heavy, so don’t compromise your form. Ensure you are completing all repetitions and sets with perfect technique before increasing the weight.

Let's do this!

 

Words/Workout: Felicia Oreb and Diana Johnson 

Photography: Vanessa Natoli / @vanesSanatoliphotography

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Barbell back squat 

1. Grabbing the barbell with your hands, place the barbell on the muscles of your upper back (trapezius) and squeeze the shoulder blades together to engage the muscles of your upper back so the bar is secure.

 

2. Stand with your feet slightly wider than your shoulders, and toes pointing slightly outwards. The feet must remain flat on the floor throughout the entire movement.

3. Keep your chest up and look straight ahead.

4. Squat as deep as your body will allow while still maintaining a neutral spine and perfect posture.

 

5. Stand back up and repeat the movement.

Tip: If it is difficult to maintain correct posture and squat to full depth (below parallel), elevate your heels with a one-inch block or some small weight plates.

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Barbell military press

1. Pick up the barbell with a pronated grip (hands over the barbell).

2. Standing tall, hold the bar high on your chest, across the front of your shoulders.

3. Push the barbell straight up above your head, maintaining a neutral spine throughout the movement. 

4. Control the barbell back down to the starting position and repeat the movement.

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 Barbell romanian deadlift

1. Pick up the barbell with your hands positioned on the outside of your legs. This ensures that the weight is close to your centre of gravity, which makes the weight easier to lift and reduces the risk of injury to the lower back.

2. Stand with your feet slightly wider than your shoulders, ensuring your feet are firmly on the floor and the weight is distributed evenly across the whole foot throughout the entire movement.

3. Hold your body tight and imagine putting your shoulder blades back and down into your back pockets. Holding this tight position, pick up the weight while keeping it as close to your body as possible, until you are standing in an upright position.

4. Still maintaining tightness, lower the weight back down by bending forward at the hips. Move the barbell back down the front of your legs until your hamstrings reach a full stretch while maintaining a neutral spine. The hips must be below the shoulders at all times. This ensures that you are using the muscles of the lower body and not just the muscles of the lower back.

5. Repeat the movement. 

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Barbell bent-over row

1.  Pick up the barbell with a pronated grip (hands over the barbell).

2. Bring your body down till you reach parallel to the ground.

3. Pull the barbell in towards your sternum, squeezing your upper back.

4. Maintain a neutral spine throughout the movement.

5. Release the barbell back down and repeat the movement.

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Barbell split squats

1. Place the barbell on the upper back muscles (trapezius).

2.Take a step forward with one leg, keeping your chest up high and shoulders back.

3.Lower your back knee down to the ground (without touching the ground) and stand back up.

5.Repeat all reps on one leg before swapping legs. 

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Barbell glute bridges

1. Begin by lying on your back on the floor.

2. Place the barbell across your pelvic area.

3. Bring your feet up to your bottom, pressing your feet into the ground.

4. Lift your hips up high and squeeze your bottom.

5. Lower your hips back down and repeat the movement.

Want to know how the Base Body Babes started? Read more about their journey here. 

 

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Is Swimming Safe in Areas With the Freshwater ‘Brain-Eating’ Amoeba?

By Dennis Thompson
HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, July 14, 2016 (HealthDay News) — The headlines are terrifying, and the story details are even worse as you read about a child who goes for a swim in a lake or river and then falls prey to a “brain-eating amoeba.”

The brain infection brought on by Naegleria fowleri, an amoeba that flourishes in warm open waters, can quickly prove fatal, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

As disturbing as these reports are, parents don’t need to bar their kids from the local swimming spot due to fear of Naegleria, infectious disease experts say.

These cases make headlines because they are so unexpected and devastating, but the infection itself is “very, very uncommon,” said Dr. Amesh Adalja, a senior associate with the University of Pittsburgh’s UPMC Center For Health Security.

“You have to think about how many times people have exposure to water that has Naegleria in it, and how few cases we actually see every year,” said Adalja, who’s also a spokesman for the Infectious Diseases Society of America.

“Each case grabs the headlines because it is so rare but so severe. I don’t think you should restrict a child’s activities because of this,” he said.

In fact, between 1937 and 2013, there were only 142 cases of Naegleria-related brain infections reported. That works out to fewer than two infections per year, a 2015 study in the Journal of the Pediatric Infectious Diseases Society said.

“Considering the millions of times that kids jump into the water every summer, it’s a very low risk,” agreed Dr. Sunil Sood, chair of Pediatrics-Infectious Disease at Southside Hospital, in Bay Shore, N.Y.

Naegleria fowleri is found in warm bodies of fresh water, such as lakes, rivers and hot springs, according to the CDC. Because the amoeba prefers warm water, it’s most commonly found in southern states.

The amoeba infects people when contaminated water forcefully enters the nose, Sood said. It migrates from the sinuses into the brain, where it causes a severe brain infection called primary amebic meningoencephalitis (PAM).

While most cases occur from a person jumping into a lake or river, the infection also can occur during a sinus rinse using a neti pot filled with tap water, Sood added. People should always use water labeled “distilled” or “sterile” in a neti pot, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Or, you can boil water yourself and use it after it has cooled down to lukewarm — about five minutes, the FDA says.

A person can’t become infected with the amoeba by drinking contaminated water, the CDC says.

More cases have been reported to the CDC in recent years, causing some to wonder if climate change is allowing the amoeba to thrive in the south and range farther north. The journal article noted that four infections have occurred in more northern states — Indiana, Kansas and Minnesota — since 2010.

But Adalja said it’s just as likely that doctors are more aware of the amoeba, increasing the odds that the brain infection will be accurately diagnosed.

“You’re starting to see more reports, but it’s hard to discern if this is because people are much more attuned to the risk now in 2016 than they were in 1985, for example,” Adalja said.

Symptoms of PAM start about five days after brain infection, the CDC says. Initial symptoms can include headache, fever, nausea or vomiting. As the disease progresses, the person may suffer from a stiff neck, confusion, difficulty thinking, hallucinations, loss of balance and seizures.

“Basically it’s infecting the brain and the membranes surrounding the brain,” Adalja said. “Because of that, it causes a pretty big inflammatory response. You have this invader there, and you have the immune system attacking it, and the brain is caught in the middle.”

After symptoms start, the disease progresses rapidly and usually causes death within about five days. The fatality rate is roughly 97 percent; only three out of 138 people infected with Naegleria between 1962 and 2015 have survived, the CDC says.

Treatments are available for Naegleria infection. For example, the CDC keeps a supply of miltefosine, an investigational breast cancer drug, on hand for treating Naegleria because the drug has been shown to effectively kill off amoeba infections.

However, survival is rare because early symptoms are common with many other illnesses, and patients don’t get the appropriate treatment until it’s too late, Adalja said.

“It will just start out with people having fever, chills and headache,” he said. “At that point, it’s hard to tell what this might be.”

Adalja and Sood said people can lower their risk of infection by avoiding activities that could send water up their noses.

“Hold your nose before you jump in the water,” Sood said. “It’s a common-sense thing, but nobody thinks of it. That will prevent that pressure that allows water to shoot up through the nose.”

Concerned parents should keep a close eye on kids who’ve been swimming, he added.

“Go to the emergency room right away if your child has a headache and a fever, especially if it occurs after swimming or a sinus rinse with a neti pot,” Sood said.

More information

For more on the Naegleria fowleri amoeba, visit the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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Early Bedtime for Preschoolers, Healthier Weight Later?

THURSDAY, July 14, 2016 (HealthDay News) — Sending preschoolers off to bed early may bring them an unexpected benefit: less chance of obesity when they are teens.

So suggests research that compared preschoolers who went to bed at 8 p.m. with same-age kids who had later bedtimes. A team at the Ohio State University College of Public Health found that a bedtime just one hour later seemed to double the likelihood that young children will be obese teens.

“For parents, this reinforces the importance of establishing a bedtime routine,” said the study’s lead author, Sarah Anderson, an associate professor of epidemiology. “It’s something concrete that families can do to lower their child’s risk.”

She added that the earlier bedtime is also likely to benefit youngsters’ social and emotional development as well as their brain development.

The study reviewed data on nearly 1,000 children who were part of a study that followed healthy babies born in 1991 at 10 U.S. locations.

When the children were about 4 years old, they were divided into three groups: those who went to bed by 8 p.m.; those whose bedtime was between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m., and those went to bed later.

Half of the youngsters went to bed between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. The rest were evenly divided between early and late bedtimes, according to the study published July 14 in the Journal of Pediatrics.

Researchers then looked at the kids’ weight at an average age of 15. They found that only 10 percent of kids with the earliest bedtimes were obese teens. That compared to 16 percent of the children with bedtimes between 8 p.m. and 9 p.m., and 23 percent of those who went to bed after 9 p.m.

Most likely to become obese were kids who went to bed latest and whose mothers’ interactions with them were observed to be less supportive and more hostile, the researchers found. They said later bedtimes were more common among non-white children who had less-educated mothers and lived in lower-income households.

However, only an association was seen between bedtimes and obesity risk, rather than a cause-and-effect link.

“It’s important to recognize that having an early bedtime may be more challenging for some families than for others,” Anderson said in a university news release. “Families have many competing demands and there are tradeoffs that get made. For example, if you work late, that can push bedtimes later in the evening.”

The study authors said their findings suggest that household routines for preschoolers are important.

More information

The U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute provides more information on the importance of sleep.

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Weight Loss Might Reduce Cancer Risk: Study

By Steven Reinberg
HealthDay Reporter

THURSDAY, July 14, 2016 (HealthDay News) — Overweight and obese women who lose weight may lower their odds of developing cancer as their levels of cancer-linked proteins drop, a new study suggests.

These proteins — VEGF, PAI-1 and PEDF — promote the growth of blood vessels, a process that is necessary to help tumors thrive. The more weight the women lost, the greater the drop in the levels of these proteins, the researchers found.

“It’s another piece of evidence in the jigsaw of the benefits of losing weight, and how important weight loss is to prevent cancer,” said lead researcher Catherine Duggan. She is a principal staff scientist in the public health sciences division of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.

In general, losing weight reduces the risk of breast, colon and prostate cancer by as much as 20 percent, she said. This might be due to a reduction in inflammatory factors stored in fat as well as a drop in levels of these proteins, Duggan suggested.

These proteins increase with weight, she explained. “As people gain weight, new blood vessels are required to bring oxygen and nutrients to the stored fat,” she said. The same process happens in men.

Whether these proteins cause cancer isn’t clear, and the study did not prove that, but they might make the environment favorable for tumors to start growing, Duggan said.

“We can’t say these factors cause cancer, but we do think that these factors may make tumors grow. So if you reduce them, these dormant cancer tumors might not make the switch and start to grow, but we can’t say for sure,” she said.

For the study, Duggan and her colleagues randomly assigned 439 overweight and obese postmenopausal women, aged 50 to 75, to one of four groups.

The groups included: a calorie-restricted diet of no more than 2,000 calories a day; an aerobic exercise program of 45 minutes of moderate to vigorous exercise five days a week; a combination of diet and exercise; or no diet or exercise. The researchers took blood samples at the start of the study and a year later.

After adjusting for weight, age, race and ethnicity, the researchers found that women in the diet and exercise groups lost from 2 percent to 11 percent of their body weight, while women who did not take part in these programs lost less than 1 percent of their body weight.

Moreover, compared with women who did not diet or exercise, those who dieted, or dieted and exercised, had significantly lower levels of the proteins. However, this effect was not apparent in women in the exercise-only group, Duggan said.

The report was published July 15 in the journal Cancer Research.

One expert isn’t sure that lowering these proteins might reduce the risk for cancer.

“We really don’t know how far down these proteins have to go to have a real effect,” said Victoria Stevens, strategic director of laboratory services at the American Cancer Society.

Cutting the blood supply to tumors has been tried, but so far the results of this approach have been mixed, she said.

But, “we know being obese or overweight increases cancer risk, so anything to avoid that, such as weight loss, should be a good thing in reducing cancer risk,” Stevens said.

More information

Visit the American Cancer Society for more on cancer.

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Can Trauma Trigger Violent Crime in Mentally Ill?

By Karen Pallarito
HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, July 13, 2016 (HealthDay News) — People with serious mental illness who are victims of violence or exposed to stressful events are more likely to engage in a violent crime in the week following the trauma, a new study contends.

Stressful experiences also affect people without psychiatric disorders, but not to the same extent, the researchers said.

Some stressful events — such as being violently victimized, injured in an accident, losing one’s parents or self-harming — act as “triggers,” said study co-author Dr. Seena Fazel. He is a professor of forensic psychiatry at the University of Oxford in England.

Experiencing one of these events increases the risk of committing a violent criminal act within a week of the trigger, especially in people with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, Fazel said.

People diagnosed with these conditions have higher rates of criminal convictions than the general population, according to the study. Identifying triggers for violence “is potentially clinically important for risk assessment,” the study authors wrote.

But Dr. J. Wesley Boyd, a professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School in Boston, said people with mental illness are much more likely to be victims than perpetrators of violent crime.

“I’m actually as much or more concerned about the trauma done to my patients by being exposed to traumatic events,” he said.

“Every time there’s another mass shooting, I have a whole host of patients who get depressed, who feel like they can’t watch TV, who feel like they can’t go outside. They become isolative, they become terrified,” Boyd explained.

Jennifer Skeem, a psychologist and associate dean of research at the University of California, Berkeley, cautioned against presenting the study results in a manner that would exacerbate the stigma of mental illness.

“The authors’ results are consistent with a larger body of literature that indicates that exposure to violence is one of many risk factors for violence,” she said.

In the study, Fazel and his colleagues used a nationwide sample of more than 2.8 million people born in Sweden between 1958 and 1988 to study potential triggers for violent crime. Almost 35,000 had schizophrenia, and nearly 30,000 had bipolar disorder. More than 2.7 million healthy individuals were included for comparison.

The study authors defined violent crime as conviction for homicide, assault, robbery, threats and violence against an officer, unlawful threats, unlawful coercion, kidnapping, illegal confinement, arson, intimidation or certain sexual offenses.

Being victimized contributed to the largest “absolute” risk of violence, with rates ranging between 70 and 177 violent crimes per 10,000 persons in the week following the violent exposure event, the study showed. That compares with “nine to 22 violent crimes per 10,000 persons during the control periods in the same individuals,” the researchers reported.

The study was published online July 13 in the journal JAMA Psychiatry.

Dr. Jan Volavka, professor emeritus at New York University School of Medicine, wrote an editorial in the same issue of the journal suggesting the need for further research into the role of stress in triggering violence.

Volavka offered this takeaway: People who experience a stressful event similar to the triggers observed in the study should not be exposed to additional stress during the following week.

“They should be treated gently,” he said.

More information

The U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration has more about trauma and violence.

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Obesity More Deadly for Men Than Women: Study

By Steven Reinberg
HealthDay Reporter

WEDNESDAY, July 13, 2016 (HealthDay News) — Obesity is nearly three times more deadly for men than it is for women, new research suggests.

In a study of nearly 4 million men and women around the globe, the risk of dying before the age of 70 was 19 percent for men and 11 percent for women of normal weight.

But that risk jumped to 30 percent and 15 percent, respectively, for obese men and women. That’s an absolute increased risk of 11 percent for men and 4 percent for women, the researchers reported.

“Obesity is second only to smoking as a cause of premature death in America,” said lead researcher Richard Peto, professor of medical statistics and epidemiology at the University of Oxford in England.

“If you could lose about 10 percent of your weight, a woman would knock 10 percent off the risk of dying before she was 70, and for a man it would knock about 20 percent off,” Peto said.

Why obese men are at greater risk for premature death than women isn’t clear.

“Our study was not able to address this question, but previous observations have suggested that obese men have greater insulin resistance, liver fat levels and diabetes risk than women,” said study co-author Dr. Emanuele Di Angelantonio, a lecturer at the University of Cambridge in England.

The study was published online July 13 in The Lancet.

One U.S. expert said more research is needed to explore the apparent link between obesity and mortality.

“We still have more work to do to better understand how weight, weight gain, and weight loss influence mortality,” said Barry Graubard, a senior investigator in the biostatistics branch of the U.S. National Cancer Institute. He co-authored an accompanying journal editorial.

Avoiding obesity has clear advantages for both men and women, Graubard said. “In addition, we know from other studies that physical activity can reduce mortality risk,” he said.

In the new study, researchers collected data on 3.9 million adults, aged 20 to 90. The information came from 189 previous studies in Europe, North America and elsewhere. The investigators included data on all those who lived at least another five years. Over the time of the study, nearly 400,000 participants died. The study findings showed that underweight people were also at risk for premature death.

The World Health Organization estimates that 1.3 billion adults worldwide are overweight, and 600 million more are obese. And, obesity has been strongly linked in previous research to heart disease, stroke, diabetes and cancer, the researchers said.

Dr. David Katz is president of the American College of Lifestyle Medicine. He said: “Although there has long been clear and decisive evidence linking obesity to increased risk for the major chronic diseases that are in turn linked to increased risk for premature death, the obesity/mortality link has been periodically challenged.”

This study overcomes many of the limitations of earlier efforts and “renders a clear and emphatic verdict — obesity increases the risk of premature death around the globe,” Katz said.

This study also indicates that the risk extends across the full range of overweight and obesity — the more severe the obesity, the graver the danger, he added.

“The obesity pandemic continues to advance, putting ever more of humanity at risk,” Katz said. “What we already had abundant cause to think, this paper gives us ample cause to know, that risk includes early death. This constitutes an urgent call for corrective actions at a global scale.”

More information

Visit the World Health Organization for more on obesity.

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How to Spot the Warning Signs of Heat Stroke

WEDNESDAY, July 13, 2016 (HealthDay News) — As people age, they are at added risk for heat stroke and other heat-related illnesses, according to the U.S. National Institute on Aging (NIA).

This is particularly true for those with chronic health issues, the agency cautions.

Heat fatigue, heat-related dizziness, heat cramps, heat exhaustion and heat stroke are all forms of hyperthermia. The condition occurs when the body is overwhelmed by heat and is unable to control its temperature, the NIA explains.

Those who lack access to air conditioning or transportation, who can’t move around, wear too much clothing or visit crowded places may be more vulnerable, the agency notes.

Other factors that increase hyperthermia risk include:

• Dehydration,
• Poor blood circulation,
• Less sweat production due to aging,
• Use of multiple medications,
• High blood pressure or other health conditions that require a reduced-salt diet,
• Heart, lung and kidney diseases, or other conditions that cause general weakness or fever,
• Being very overweight or underweight,
• Drinking alcohol.

When temperatures, air pollution and humidity spike, older people with chronic health issues like heart disease and diabetes should stay indoors, the NIA advises. Those who don’t have air conditioning should go to a mall, senior center, library or other cool location.

Heat-related illnesses require immediate medical attention. The NIA says it’s essential to recognize the warning signs, including:

• Fever (generally above 104 degrees Fahrenheit),
• Confusion or combativeness,
• Strong, rapid pulse,
• Dry, flushed skin,
• Lack of sweating,
• Feeling faint,
• Staggering,
• Coma.

Anyone who may be suffering from a heat-related illness should be taken to a shady or air-conditioned spot and told to lie down. A cold, wet cloth should be applied to the wrists, neck, armpits and groin to help cool the blood. If the person can swallow, he or she should be given nonalcoholic fluids, like water or apple juice, according to the NIA.

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provides more information on older people and heat-related illness.

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Newly Released Inmates Account for 1 in 10 Fatal ODs

WEDNESDAY, July 13, 2016 (HealthDay News) — Almost 10 percent of fatal adult drug overdoses may involve recently released prison inmates, a new Canadian study suggests.

“This is the first Canadian study to examine overdose mortality rates by matching incarceration records with coroner reports after release,” said study author Dr. Nav Persaud. He is a scientist with the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute of St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto.

“We were surprised at how high the fatal overdose rate was among those who were recently released from provincial custody — almost 12 times higher than the general population,” Persaud added.

Not only did one in 10 overdose deaths involve a recently released inmate, but the risk for a fatal overdose among inmates was found to be highest immediately following release, the study found.

“Previous research has speculated that the higher risk for overdose immediately following release can be attributed to periods of no or less frequent drug use while individuals are incarcerated,” Persaud said in a St. Michael’s news release.

“Once released, these individuals may not realize that their tolerance has diminished and [they] can accidentally overdose,” he explained.

The investigators analyzed data provided by the Ontario Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services, which registered the releases of roughly 50,000 inmates between 2006 and 2013. The release dates were then cross-referenced with coroner report information.

The team also observed that most of the deaths involved opioid use.

“At least some of these deaths are preventable and there may be opportunities to prevent overdose deaths by supporting this vulnerable group — during incarceration and immediately following release,” said Persaud.

“Future research and policy should focus on immediate interventions, such as directing people to treatment programs and providing better access to [the anti-overdose drug] naloxone, drug substitution therapies and overdose prevention education,” he added.

The findings were published in the July 6 issue of PLOS One.

More information

There’s more on opioid drug overdose risk at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

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Cash Rewards Won’t Change Outcomes for HIV-Infected Drug Addicts: Study

WEDNESDAY, July 13, 2016 (HealthDay News) — Giving drug-addicted, HIV-positive people cash incentives to help improve unhealthy behaviors doesn’t work, a new study finds.

The study, funded by the U.S. National Institute on Drug Abuse, tracked outcomes for HIV-infected people with substance-abuse problems — a notoriously tough group to treat, the researchers said.

To lower rates of HIV infection and illness, “we must get serious about hard-to-reach populations” like these, lead researcher Lisa Metsch, of Columbia University in New York City, explained in a university news release.

Giving people cash rewards for healthy improvements in behavior — for example, exercising or stopping smoking — has been somewhat successful for other patient populations.

So, Metsch’s group wondered if a similar approach might help HIV-infected people battling drug or alcohol abuse.

To find out, the investigators tracked outcomes for more than 800 people cared for at 11 hospitals in major cities across the United States. Patients were randomly assigned to one of three groups: usual treatment (patients were linked to outpatient HIV care/substance abuse treatment); six months of “patient navigation” (where case managers helped patients coordinate their care); or six months of patient navigation plus financial incentives.

These incentives were cash rewards with a value of up to $1,160, given if the patient succeeded in cutting back on substance abuse, adhering to HIV care, and improving clinical outcomes when it came to HIV.

However, the team reported that rates of suppression of HIV on blood tests were the same after one year, regardless of which group the patients were enrolled in. In each group, only about one-third of patients achieved successful viral suppression, Metsch’s group said.

Why didn’t patient navigation or the cash bonuses help? “Participants in this trial face complex issues including considerable socioeconomic disadvantage,” theorized Metsch, who is chair of sociomedical sciences at Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health.

Her team believes more research is needed to find ways to reach people who battle both addiction and HIV infection.

“We will not achieve an AIDS-free generation if we don’t address substance use and the other [illnesses] that come with substance use,” Metsch said.

The findings were published July 12 in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

More information

There’s more on HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, at AIDS.gov.

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Dodge the Jet Lag, Enjoy Your Trip

WEDNESDAY, July 13, 2016 (HealthDay News) — People crossing time zones may assume jet lag is something they have to endure — like airport delays and lost luggage. But there are several ways travelers can prepare for and minimize jet lag’s troubling effects, a sleep specialist says.

First, flying from west to east, such as from the United States to Europe, will result in worse jet lag than the reverse trip, explained David Earnest, who studies circadian rhythms at Texas A&M Health Science Center College of Medicine.

“You will always be hit harder by jet lag when making a four- to six-hour time jump eastbound,” Earnest said in a university news release.

“This is because our body clocks are trying to advance to an earlier time, which is not as easy as adjusting to a later time gap,” he said.

Earnest provided the following recommendations on how to ease jet lag:

• Catch the red eye. Sleeping through an overnight flight is one of the best ways to reduce the effects of jet lag. Earnest noted, however, those who aren’t able to sleep on an overnight flight will be tired once they land in the early morning.
• Avoid sleep aids. These drugs can confuse the body clock and may worsen jet lag. They also remain in the bloodstream and can make travelers feel groggy or hung over.
• Pass on the alcohol or caffeine. It’s a good idea to avoid these beverages on overnight flights. “It is acceptable to consume caffeine to help you stay awake at the new location, though,” Earnest said.
• Plan ahead. People who adjust their current schedules ahead of time to accommodate the time zone of their destination may not feel as jet-lagged. This should be done at least four days before traveling. Sleep and meal times can be gradually moved about one hour per day.
• Consider melatonin therapy. Melatonin is a hormone that circulates in high levels at night. It tells the body when it’s nighttime and time for sleep. Unlike sleep aids, melatonin doesn’t stay in the bloodstream long. Travelers may want to consider taking an over-the-counter melatonin supplement five days before traveling at the local time that coincides with evening at their destination. It will acclimate you to feel sleepy at the new location’s time. It’s best to check with your physician before taking any new supplement.
• Try to adjust right away. “Walk around, drink some coffee and explore the new city,” said Earnest. “It’s better to tough it out and wait to sleep until night.” Exposure to sunlight will help the body adjust to a new time zone. It’s fine to get to bed on the early side but avoid trying to “sleep off” jet lag.

Delayed adjustment — not allowing your body clock to sync properly — ups your risk of illness. And that’s especially true since you’ve already been in the closed environment of the airplane, Earnest added.

“Your immune system is probably already compromised. There are merits to doing the right thing and waiting until dark to sleep it off, even though that’s not necessarily what your body is telling you to do,” he noted.

More information

The National Sleep Foundation provides more information on jet lag.

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