Canadian men are being advised not to change much.
The hope is that small, incremental alterations to lifestyle will help form habits that will be beneficial to the health of Canada’s male population, which, statistically, is poorer than the overall health statistics attributed to Canadian women.
In June, the Canadian Men’s Health Foundation launched its Don’t Change Much campaign, built around the concept that small steps become habit, and habit becomes a healthier lifestyle. Also, the inaugural Canadian Men’s Health Week, culminating on Father’s Day, ran from June 9 to 15 this year, to help further awareness about ways the male population can, through lifestyle change, potentially improve health outcomes.
In Powell River, Dr. David May has spearheaded a men’s health group with a small contingent of his patients, using support and accountability as a mechanism to shift outcomes.
“I recently did a healthy men’s group and I titled it: How to Dance at Your Grandchildren’s Wedding,” May said. “Nobody’s talking about being immortal here. We are talking about living quality life.
“There’s definitely a sweet spot between the fifth and sixth decades where you can make huge differences to the quality of your life on average by the lifestyle you choose to lead.”
May said if the blood testing is to be believed, there were participants in his men’s group that had diabetes at the beginning of the sessions, and didn’t have diabetes at the end of the sessions, based on gains in health that they made.
He said nine or 10 years ago, he went to his own physician with borderline cholesterol and high blood pressure. “She laughed at me,” May said. “She said there was nothing I didn’t know that she knew. She said: ‘It’s either drugs or lifestyle. What do you want?’”
He made a decision. May said that so far he’s been able to stay away from prescriptions after some “fairly dramatic change in lifestyle.”
The good side effects of making lifestyle changes can mean protection against chronic health issues such as diabetes, heart disease and cancer. Recent studies point toward an up-to-50 per cent reduction in Alzheimer’s disease in men who exercise 45 minutes each session, five times a week.
“There’s no drug I can prescribe that is going to give that degree of protection,” said May.
That type of exercise regimen, however, requires commitment.
When May set up his men’s group, he selected patients who he thought might be amenable to participating. Eight attended and the meetings were run by May and a male registered nurse.
“We mainly talked about exercise and diet,” May said. “We had four meetings, each about two hours long, and used the camaraderie of the group to work together to ask each other about their exercise. That’s a very powerful tool.”
During the meetings May avoided a lecture format. Evidence suggests that not much behaviour change is achieved through lecture. Discussions regarding parameters of exercise and healthy eating were conducted as a way into talking about lifestyle changes. The gains that the participants made were made outside May’s sessions.
The group also, including May, held each other to account. He said that he goes through cycles where he is less than inspired with healthy lifestyle measures.
“I need to be motivated,” he said. “The long-term gratification of dancing at my grandchildren’s weddings is not good enough to motive me to exercise. I need short-term goals.”
One, for example, is participating in a triathlon with his daughter in a month’s time. May said he has no expectation of winning the race.
“We are doing it so we can have quality life,” he said. “If you really ask people what their quality of life is, it’s their loved ones.
“At the end of the day, if you ask Canadians how they want to die, they want to die in their own bed with their loved ones surrounding them.”
May said the model used in his men’s health sessions has merit but the hard nut to crack is trying to motivate men to come to meetings such as these.
“I used my capital as those people’s doctor and from then on it can become self-perpetuating,” he said.
Running the sessions meant extra work in May’s medical practice, but he said he’d like to think that the Canadian health care system is moving more toward preventive medicine. May said he does not have enough time to run a men’s group continuously because he’s fully involved running his own family practice, running an anaesthesia practice, and assisting with palliative care.
Still, he will remain active in reinforcing the benefits of healthy lifestyle through his patient interface.
“In the fifth and sixth decades, if you set up good habits, then you can make big changes,” he said. “You can get away with doing all sorts of things in your first three decades and your body is quite forgiving, but it starts to show in your fifth and sixth decades.”
May said he assesses people on a daily basis pre-operatively for anaesthesia and part of that assessment is determining how healthy they are.
“The curves really separate by the fifth decade between people who are exercising and people who aren’t,” May said. “You really notice the huge differences starting in the fifth decade with people who are exercising.
“I always tell medical students, if they could ask just one question as to how well a patient is going to do with anaesthetic, just ask: do you exercise on a regular basis? If the answer is yes, you can’t, of course, be 100 per cent sure that an anaesthetic is going to go well even in someone who exercises, but it certainly stacks the odds in their favour.”
Over and above the men’s health group that May sponsored, he provides guidance to his patients in the examining room.
“I guess being a man in my 50s helps,” he said. “I can tell my story about what I’m having to do.”
For example, May said he does not enjoy exercise. Some of his friends, when they run, experience runner’s high, but he doesn’t like running. He likes the gratification of knowing he’ll finish a triathlon with his daughter, but when he’s in the middle of his exercises, “it’s not a pretty sight.”
However, the benefit of healthy lifestyle outweighs some inconvenience in pursuing it, so May has made a commitment. He is hoping men in Powell River and around the country will see the benefits from making a similar commitment.
