But the best chairs in the world will do you no good, if you continue to stoop or slouch while in a sitting position. Swiss Balls substituted as chairs can go a long way in helping you regain your posture. Based on your height, you choose the right sized ball and simply use that instead of a chair. But what do you do when you already have an office chair and rolling a Swiss Ball into office is not an option? Well, you can now use the next best thing: a FitBALL Seating Disc that sits right on your chair while still offering the benefits of a Swiss Ball.

Disclosure: I was sent one (1) FitBALL Seating Disc directly from the manufacturer (Ball Dynamics) to try out and then present a product review on FitnessMantra. You can be assured that my reviews will always be unbiased, irrespective of whether I purchase the product or receive it to review.

Product: FitBALL Seating Disc
Manufacturer: Ball Dynamics International, LLC
Presentation: One 15-inch inflatable Seating Disc with an extra air-hole-plug and a plug-removing tool.

First Impressions

The Seating Disc has a strong rubbery texture and has the feel of a good quality product that should last for a long time. You don’t require a pump to inflate this disc and the air-hole plug does an excellent job of keeping the disc at the right inflation level even after extended periods of usage. When first inflated, the Seating Disc warped a little bit near the edges, but after a day’s use and adjusting the inflation level, these disappeared.

One sure sign you probably don’t have a good posture while sitting? It hurts when you sit right! And this is exactly what I felt within 10 minutes of using the Seating Disc. It’s amazing how much my lower back started to resist my sitting on the Disc although it might be true that continuing to use this product will eventually resolve that issue. It takes a few attempts to get the inflation level just right for you. It’s probably not a good idea to over-inflate the Disc to avoid extreme instability while seated. At the same time, under-inflating the Disc will make it too stable and chair-like and so won’t really enforce a change in your posture.

How the Seating Disc Is Supposed To Help You

So how does this thing work and why is it supposed to be good for your (lower) back? The key is a word I have been using many time in the past few sentences: stability (or rather “instability”). Every small (mostly unnoticeable) movement that you make to stabilize yourself on this Disc while sitting utilizes the smaller muscles around your lower core (abdomen) and lumbar region. The eventual strengthening of these muscles is supposed to go a long way in alleviating the lower-back pains most commonly associated with extended periods of sitting. Also, by enforcing a good posture, you will most likely gradually learn to sit erect and keep your lower back curved inwards which is the right way to sit.

Working On The Ball

Along with the Seating Disc, I also received the book “Working On The Ball” by Jane Clapp and Sarah Robichaud - a guide to achieving fitness in the office by working on a Swiss Ball. The book describes various little exercises you can perform on a Ball while using it as a chair in the workplace. Granted, most of these exercises will make you look and feel a little silly, but they are supposed to help you get through the day without that nagging pain in your lower-back by evening. Since most of the exercises described in this book deal with a Stability Ball, only a few of them could be adapted to work on a Seating Disc.

Prolonged Use And Discomfort

While the initial effects of enforcing posture are all well and good, prolonged use is an altogether different story. I personally had to get off the Disc after about 15-20 minutes because of soreness I felt in my lower-back. While I am sure this may have something to do with my incorrect posture before using the Disc and it’s possible that extended use may very well reduce this soreness, I would like to hear from other users of Discs or Swiss Balls as chairs. If you use such devices for sitting the whole day, do comment on whether you had any discomfort during the early days of usage. For now, I plan to use for about half-an-hour at a time - once in the morning and once in the afternoon.

Science Behind The Seating Disc

Finally, I would just like to mention a couple of points from a scientific perspective. I tried to look up research concerning the usage of Swiss Balls as chair-replacements and while most do not disapprove of their usage, the results as far as benefits go have been quite inconclusive. For example, a study titled “Stability ball versus office chair: comparison of muscle activation and lumbar spine posture during prolonged sitting” finds that although there is a slight increase in muscular activity, there is increased discomfort as well, causing the study’s authors to come to the following conclusion: “The small changes in biological responses when sitting on a stability ball as compared with an office chair, combined with the increased reported discomfort while on the ball, suggests its use for prolonged sitting may not be advantageous”.
Another study, “Sitting on a chair or an exercise ball: various perspectives to guide decision making“, tried to discern the cause of possible discomfort: “Sitting on a ball appears to spread out the contact area possibly resulting in uncomfortable soft tissue compression perhaps explaining the reported discomfort.” and concluded that “The results of this study suggest that prolonged sitting on a dynamic, unstable seat surface does not significantly affect the magnitudes of muscle activation”

Conclusions

So it certainly looks like the jury is out on the real benefits of using Stability Balls or Seating Discs. But one thing to keep in mind is that if the discomfort is only caused because we have been sitting with a wrong posture until now and are trying to correct that, extended usage might indeed help fix the problem. I would welcome comments from users who have tried such devices for longer periods and have experiences (either positive or negative) to share. As for the answer to the question “Is the Seating Disc right for me?”, well, you’ll never know until you try one for yourself, will you?!

After over a year of research, analysis, design and testing, I am proud to reveal the fact that I finally have a prototype that is ready for public use. I have decided to call this tool the “Actively Progressive & Regressive Intelligent Lipoanalytic Fully Operational Obesity Lowerer” and as its name suggests, this tool will intelligently analyze and remove the bothering layers of fat that plague many an obese person.

The Lipoanalytic Obesity Lowerer

What to the untrained eye looks like a regular power-drill is in fact the result of my hard labor over the past several months. In the complete privacy of your home, you can use this Lipoanalytic Obesity Lowerer (LOL) to literally suck out the problem areas in your body!

How it works:

1. Connect the LOL to a standard power source.
2. Attach the supplied “Reductive Obesity Tool For LOL” (ROTFL) to the LOL.
3. Switch on the apparatus
4. Point the tip of the ROTFL to the problem area like your hips or thighs and press against the skin lightly.
5. Watch as the bit bores right through your skin and simply sucks out the excess fat and stores it in the “Fat Accumulation Repository Carrying Excess” chamber located at the base of the LOL
6. Simply repeat the procedure at various locations on the body, remembering to empty out the fat container at regular intervals.
7. That’s it! A trim and toned body can be yours with almost no effort on your part!

Imagine! No more diets of fresh fruits, vegetables or lean meats! No more exercising for hours in the gym! Strength-training? Who needs that when the LOL makes it so easy to lose weight?

You just need to be aware of a few negligible side-effects:

1. 1/2 inch holes on your body at the places where you have reduced the fat: Nothing to worry much about - just cover up the holes with silly putty and apply facial make-up at the right places. No one will notice anything different - unless you take a bath or someone pokes you right in the holes!
2. Missing body parts: Sometimes, if you are not careful, the odd kidney or lung could get sucked out along with the fat. Again, this is not much of an issue with those body parts which you have two of. But I would, of course, advise you to be extra cautious around “single” body parts like the heart or liver.
3. Massive infection around the holes: Although we urge you to sterilize the ROTFL before use, we have seen several cases of massive infection around the areas of application. Related side-effects include blood loss, dizziness, headache, earache, bodyache, nausea, sea-sickness, disorientation, feelings of superiority, bulimia, anorexia and even overweight and obesity.

I am sure you will agree that these minimal side-effects are a small price to pay to achieve the body of your dreams with almost no effort on your part. If you are convinced that the LOL is the best thing since sliced carbohydrates, simply place your order today and I’ll rush you your very own LOL!

It’s time to bid goodbye to healthy eating and exercising. Forget calories and saturated fat. Enjoy everything from French Fries to Chicken Wings and then simply suck out your fat with the one and only LOL!

Order Now!

To place an order for your very own “Actively Progressive & Regressive Intelligent Lipoanalytic Fully Operational Obesity Lowerer” (APRIL FOOL), please send me an email with your contact information and just sit back and get ready to lose weight (mostly from your wallet)!

While it has been known that obesity and even being overweight were big risk factors for the incidence of Alzheimer’s Disease (a degenerative disease of the brain causing dementia), a new study of 6500 people, published in the journal Neurology, reveals that a large waistline during middle-age could triple the risk of Alzheimer’s during that person’s old-age.

It has not been conclusively determined as to why a large waist-size is such a good predictor of Alzheimer’s, but theories abound:

Research linking obesity to dementia does not reveal precisely why being overweight can affect your ageing brain, but many specialists believe that associated problems such as high blood pressure, diabetes and high cholesterol levels may contribute. Thickness of fat around the waist is thought to correspond closely with its presence around the major organs of the body.

It could also very well be that the very lifestyle that led to the large waistline in the first case could be the cause the scientists are looking for.

More health and fitness stories for the week gone by:

1. Large waist ‘an Alzheimer’s risk’: A big waistline in your 40s could almost triple the threat of dementia in old age, according to US research.
2. Fat City? 10 Million Pounds Gained in 2 Years: Obesity and with it diabetes are the only widespread major health conditions that are getting worse in New York City
3. New York City Postpones Plan Mandating Fast Food Menu Calorie List: Health officials in New York City postponed the deadline for national chain restaurants to post calorie counts on city menus.
4. Older Women Have Harder Time Preserving Muscle Than Men: Keeping in good shape is more difficult for older women than men because it’s harder for women to replace muscle that’s lost naturally as they age, say U.S. and British researchers.
5. All-you-can-eat sports seats fill fans up - and out: A growing trend in all-you-can-eat seating at sports venues is making baseball’s summer chorus sound more like “Take Me Out to the Buffet.”
6. Obese Women Less Likely to Be Tested for Some Cancers: A new review of 32 studies suggests that obese women — particularly white women — are more likely than others to skip screenings for breast and cervical cancer.

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[...] the weight gains were particularly concentrated among the heaviest New Yorkers. The city’s rates of obesity and new diabetes diagnoses both increased by 17 percent during the two-year study period, compared with a 6 percent increase in obesity prevalence and no increase in diabetes diagnoses nationally.[NY Times]

“Broad”way indeed!

The city’s Health Commissioner, Dr. Thomas Frieden is obviously troubled and he does recognize that educating the consumer about cutting down on calorie-consumption is an important first-step toward solving this very real crisis:

“To tackle this problem and help prevent the devastating effects of these conditions, New Yorkers must to take in fewer calories, and to help them do that we must change our environment. Consumers must have calorie information readily available when they are ordering food at chain restaurants …[NY Times]

Too bad his own city is not with him when it comes to providing calorie-information to its citizens. New York’s chain restaurants were supposed to post calorie counts of menu items starting Monday. But the inevitable court-challenge from the New York State Restaurant Association group means that New York cannot enforce this law until April 14th. Why? Apparently some constitutional rights were being infringed!:

[...] the state restaurant association says the rule violates the First Amendment. The group believes it forces businesses to put message on their menus.[AHN]

With things the way they are, is it any wonder that even simple - and potentially life-saving - procedures and regulations take forever to see the light of day?

Much has been said about the obesity epidemic: It’s caused by people eating more than they expend. It’s McDonald’s fault. It’s just a consequence of modern life. Probably, it’s worse than terrorism. Heck, maybe obesity is just hype and not an “epidemic” at all!

Well, turns out that if there is one thing scientists can agree on, it’s that they cannot agree on any fixed factors for obesity! Calling for a “comprehensive action” to fight global obesity, researchers at the Canadian Institutes of Health Research basically said that a slew of factors are to be considered to determine the causes and potential cures for obesity.

Genetics, micro-nutrients (or, rather, the lack of them), poor sleep and even the neighborhood environment (availability of walking paths and parks) were all mentioned as possible factors for the increased waist-lines across the globe:

For changes to make a difference in people’s behavior, and then in their health, they must be comprehensive, addressing the physical, economic, sociocultural and political environment people live in, [...] — comparable to the public health campaign against tobacco use. [Yahoo News - Reuters]

Keep all that that in mind as you read through the week’s top health and fitness stories:

1. Eggs Are Back On a Roll: After years of being marginalized, eggs are staging a slight comeback, which is either a good thing or a worrisome trend, depending on who weighs in on the topic.
2. Comprehensive action needed to fight obesity: The problem of obesity cannot be reduced simply to genetics, [...] and it also cannot be blamed solely on our environments or learned behaviors.
3. Folate ‘may keep sperm healthy’: A diet rich in the vitamin folate may protect men against producing abnormal sperm and children with genetic abnormalities, a study suggests.
4. Is Washing Veggies Enough?: What do the food safety experts do? They wash their produce in running tap water—and eat up.
5. Gender differences hit the kitchen: Men were much more likely to eat asparagus, Brussels sprouts, peas and peanuts. [...] Women are more likely than men to eat eggs, yogurt and fresh hamburgers.
6. Vegan diet ‘help’ for arthritis: Rheumatoid arthritis patients may be able to reduce their high risk of heart attacks and strokes with a gluten-free, vegan diet, a study suggests.

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With sedentary lifestyles the norm for most Americans these days, the President’s Challenge is a real wake-up call to both adults and children (if you’re older than 6, you’re part of the targeted group!) to get moving toward fitness. There are awards to honor states with the highest percentages of participation at the end of the challenge, as well.

To get started, create a profile at the President’s Challenge website. Are you up to it?

Finally, an article I have been waiting to read! The prevalence of low-fat, low-calorie, diet and 100-calorie foods had really gotten me thinking: do these things work? Can you become skinny on Diet Coke and Lean Cuisine? “Junk-food dieters fake their way to skinny” attempts to answer just such a question and makes for great reading.

It’s amazing to see the lengths people will go to in order to avoid overeating. Chewing gum, sucking on lollipops, smoking, chugging a Diet Soda all day - each of this is used by different people as an alternative to eating real food. The kicker, of course, is that if the same people ate real (unprocessed) food instead, the proteins, fiber and natural fat would probably have kept them full longer and obviated the need to depend on artificial solutions to hunger-cravings.

Here are the week’s top health and fitness stories:

1. Junk food advert code launched: A global campaign aimed at reducing the marketing of unhealthy food to children has been launched.
2. New method finds networks of genes behind obesity: “Obesity is not a disease that is the result of a single change to a single gene. It changes entire networks,”
3. Diabetes: Of Mice and Men: Destroying killer-T cells is supposed to stop the immune system from chomping up beta cells. In mice, it did. The real shock, however, was that with the killer T-cells eliminated, beta cells apparently regenerated enough to pump out sufficient insulin to
4. 10 diet flubs - and how to fix them: We’ve uncovered 10 sneaky ways your workout, your work habits and even your clothing can undermine your diet, and we devised easy fixes for each.
5. Junk-food dieters fake their way to skinny: According to their credo, low-calorie is good; no-calorie is better - even if the food contains more chemicals than a can of hair spray.
6. Overweight women have worse breast cancer: study: A dangerous type of breast cancer, known as inflammatory breast cancer, was seen in 45 percent of obese patients, compared with 30 percent of overweight patients and 15 percent of patients of healthy weight.
7. Personal Contact Helps Maintain Weight Loss: [...] a new study finds that when people have monthly personal contact with a weight-loss professional, they’re able to keep off more weight.
8. Going green: Tips for eco-friendly exercise: Going green with your workout routine is actually pretty easy to do. Here’s how:
9. Obesity tied to higher pancreatic cancer risk: New research suggests that obesity may raise older adults’ risk of developing pancreatic cancer, one of the deadliest forms of the disease.
10. Vitamin D ‘cuts risk of diabetes’: Giving young children vitamin D supplements may reduce their risk of developing type 1 diabetes later in life, research suggests.
11. Boston bans use of trans fat in restaurants: The city’s health board gave final, unanimous approval yesterday to a ban on the artificial substance in french fries, doughnuts, and other dishes made in restaurants and grocery stores.
12. Minimal Exercise Benefits Overweight Postmenopausal Women: Just 10 minutes to 30 minutes of exercise a day can improve the quality of life for sedentary, overweight or obese women, American researchers suggest.

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Some of the most recognizable diet goofs I read were overcompensating after exercise by eating larger meals (Hey! I exercised!), not counting calories and sticking to a tired-old exercise routine (which your body is probably pretty good at completing effortlessly by now).

One of the items, which dealt with hiding under comfy clothes which could hide the bulge-buildup within, reminded me of a quick-tip I wrote more than a year ago: Make Sure You Regularly Use Signal Clothes. In that post, I mentioned:

The best kind of signal clothes is a pair of nicely-fitting trousers that do not have any form of elastic at the waist (I have noticed that jeans sometimes have a habit of stretching out an inch or two and so they make poor signal clothes.)

Essentially, you want to keep close those clothes that will warn you as soon as you start putting on weight. This strategy is particularly effective since weight is typically first put on in the abdominal region.

Which of these dieting mistakes will you correct first?

Ah the French! How we envy their rich foods, fine cheeses, aromatic wines, delectable chocolates and … slim waists? Wait, how is that possible? There must be some mistake! Aren’t rich foods and cheeses and chocolates the very antithesis of a slim waist? Well, not really, as this article points out!

The crucial component of eating - knowing when to stop - is a complex system of several cues a person gets. Some are internal (feeling of fullness, a nausea from overeating, tastelessness after awhile and so on. Others are external: The game is still on! Others are still eating! … etc. And as is by now pretty obvious to the discerning reader, it’s the internal cues that we must train ourselves to react to. It’s also one of the most difficult things to do and something that the French are, apparently, pretty adept at: they simply know when to stop eating!

In a Cornell Food Lab Study, both Parisians and Chicagoans were asked the simple question “How do you know when you are through eating dinner?” The different answers speak for themselves:

The Parisians said they knew they were through when they no longer felt hungry or when the food no longer tasted good to them. Their answers suggested that they’re influenced by internal cues — whether they liked the taste of the food or whether they wanted to leave room for a later dessert — to tell them dinner’s over.
In Chicago, it was a different ball game. The 145 Americans relied on external cues of satiety. They said they knew they were through eating when they cleaned their plate, when everyone else at the table was finished or when the TV show they were watching was over. [MSNBC]

Some of this difference has to do genetics and body weight composition (the heavier folks tended to rely on external cues). But a lot of it has to do with culture and the relationship a group of people have with their food. While we tend to rush around and keep food as an “on the go” commodity and tend to combine the eating of our “fast” foods with other activities, it might benefit us all to take a moment and admire how the French take time out of their day to sit, relax, enjoy and really eat their food.

Therein, in all probability, lies the secret to rich food that still results in healthy bodies.

Here are the week’s top health and fitness stories:

1. Stop when full? You must be French: In deciding when it’s time to push away from the table, it seems that the French may be responding to different eating signals than Americans.
2. Alcohol ‘quickly’ cuts heart risk: New moderate drinkers were 38% less likely to develop heart disease than those who stayed tee-total, a four-year study involving 7,500 people found.
3. Working out? Don’t sweat how much you perspire: “You don’t have to sweat to get a good workout, and exercising in higher temperatures and humidity can be dangerous,”
4. Are fears of a fat planet overblown?: “The obesity epidemic has absolutely been exaggerated,” said Dr. Vincent Marks, emeritus professor of clinical biochemistry at the University of Surrey.
5. Inside Info About Eating Out: Letting a restaurant do the cooking for you may be quick, easy and tasty, but it can also mean relinquishing control over what you eat — and even how much.
6. Device helps fat kids cut TV time: A monitoring device that cut TV and computer time in half helped young, overweight children eat less and lose weight
7. Breakfast keeps teens lean: Teenagers who regularly eat breakfast tend to weigh less, exercise more and eat a more healthful diet than their breakfast-skipping peers

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