Blog Posts in Category: Sarah Shaw
How to Get Moving at Work If you are finding yourself working or learning from home for the foreseeable future; you are probably not moving around as much as you used to. Maybe you even roll out of bed every morning and get straight to work at your desk without doing anything else in order to maximize the amount of sleep you get. Although this may seem like a good idea, it is only adding to your new sedentary lifestyle. To get moving at work or school from your desk, check out these tips... Read More
A Few Key Terms Have you ever received some random piece of mail or email to let you know that your health insurance policy has been renewed along with a long list of benefits? Well if you have ever tried to read one of these paper or electronic novels, it’s like learning a new language. Today, I am going to define a few common health insurance terms to help provide you with some clarity as most of you have just renewed a policy. Copayment: This might be one that you are all familiar with.... Read More
Staying Safe and Warm Is it just me, or is anyone else starting to get cabin fever? I find myself reminiscing the days of going for daily afternoon walks and runs when the weather was more mild. Now it's cold and gets dark early, and even though I could go out for a run or a walk still, I can never seem to get it quite right. I either end up dripping in sweat under all the layers, or calling it quits after 2 minutes because it's just too cold. Yet I see people almost daily going for runs and... Read More
How did they do it? Since the start of the pandemic last March, you may have heard about New Zealand and their efforts to combat COVID-19 periodically in the news cycle. Early on in the pandemic, they were actually headlining a lot for their harsh lockdowns and border closings. Looking back now, it seems that those efforts were worth it as the majority of the country has been COVID-free since early fall. In fact, it has been so COVID-free that people are attending live concerts, sporting... Read More
An update on the new Johnson & Johnson vaccine Every day worldwide, thousands of people are getting their COVID-19 vaccines. Let’s just stop and think about how hopeful that sounds… The two vaccines that have been distributed in the US since early December have been manufactured by Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech. These companies both produced vaccines require two doses approximately 4 weeks apart to reach full effectiveness. Both have an efficacy rate of about 95% at preventing severe COVID-... Read More
How One Small Change Made a Big Impact It has been a while since I addressed chronic stress in my blogs. Since I have started at Healthy UNH, I have written blogs about managing stress during the pandemic, how stress can impact our physical health, and have even written about fun and relaxing techniques to reduce stress. Now as we are coming up on the one year anniversary of the pandemic, I have been thinking about this “anniversary” the last few days. I have been reflecting on how I have... Read More
Some Dos and Don’ts If you have decided that it’s time to ditch the home gym and open up a new gym membership, I’m sure there is one thing weighing heavy on your mind; wearing a mask at the gym and how operations have changed. Wearing a mask while exercising seems daunting at first, and can make any workout ten times harder, but today I am going to share a few dos and don’ts for going to the gym during a pandemic. At the start of the pandemic, my gym shutdown. So I started exercising at... Read More
Is There Really a Difference? Think of the last time you were in the drug store. Whether you were looking for something for a headache, a sore throat, allergies, or something in between; you probably found yourself wondering whether you should go with the brand name drugs or the generic ones. They are set at different prices, have different packaging, and are even made by different companies. There must be a difference in quality, right? Turns out, there is a difference, but it might not be... Read More
How Physical Activity Can Prevent Cardiovascular Disease We have always heard the general recommendation to get physical activity for long-term heart health; but there is always the question, how much exercise should we be getting to reap the benefits for our heart health? Recently, the University of Oxford published results from a study that included more than 90,000 participants. The study attempted to answer the question “how much exercise do you need to have long-term heart health... Read More
Prioritizing Your Wellness this Semester Welcome back, Wildcats! We have officially made it through the longest winter break ever (literally)! As we are now in the spring semester it might be easier for some people than the fall semester. We get an extra few minutes of daylight and we have nicer weather almost every day. For those who may have just started at UNH last fall, you all have the opportunity to take on a semester feeling more established as a wildcat. And before you know it, we will... Read More