If you have heard Dr. Uche Odiatu on the podcast or have been lucky enough to have seen him present, you know he has a ton of energy! We wish he would bottle it up and give us each a drop. He gives us some inside tips on how to find our energy on this week’s TIPisode!
Listen to more great episodes with Dr. Uche on the podcast and also find him at druche.com. He can be found on Facebook and Instgram @fitspeakers
This TIPisode has been transcribed for your viewing pleasure:
Michelle Strange: A Tale of Two Hygienists presents this week’s TIPisode: Quick and easy tips to keep you up to date, and presented by the experts in the profession. Now, get ready for your unofficial TIPisode.
Dr. Uche Odiatu: Uche Odiatu here. I’m just leaving Vancouver. Lectured for two days at the Pacific Dental Conference 2019. Had a blast. Huge rooms. Major fun. A big question people always ask me is where do I get my energy from? “Where do you get that zest for life and passion, and does it come in a bottle?” And I’m like, “No.”
There’s certain things that I do every day that boost my energy, and one of them is exercise. So this section, or segment, is going to be called “Exercise is Medicine” because of the way that exercise effects the physiology of the body.
We have 600 muscles, 206 bones, and 360 joints. Pushing our feet away from the table and texting into our cell phone is an insult to the body. We have to do is preform, I’d say, most days of the week. And there’s three different kinds of exercise: There’s resistance training, there’s aerobic training, and there’s flexibility training. Less than three percent of the 380 million people in North America do all three. So less than three percent of the 380 million people in North America do all three. But the three percent that do, they get access to all kinds of energy reserves.
Science has shown that most people by age 55, almost half our mitochondria are no longer functioning. Almost half our mitochondria are no longer functioning. Mitochondria, as you know from your college days, is what makes ATP. ATP is the energy power source in the body. So young people have lots; kids age 2 to 10 to 15 to 20. But by age 50, 55, half our mitochondria are turned off. So, if someone is not exercising, they have no access to this mitochondrial powerhouse. But McMaster University studies in Ontario have shown that you can actually epigenetically turn back on mitochondria that have shut down due to aging and lack of use. So that’s one of the reasons why I exercise. If you want more energy, you will have more mitochondria at your disposal. You’ll have more numbers, and they’ll also be larger.
Another reason why healthcare professionals need to exercise is that after age 30, we lose one percent of our muscle mass every year, which means nothing to a 35 year old. You’re thinking, “Oh, big deal. Five percent.” However, by age 50, it’s 20 percent. By age 70, you’ve lost almost half of your muscle mass, which leads you walking and moving like a little old man and lady, and walking slowly and being fragile because of being old basically because you’ve lost muscle mass, all but half of it.
University of Copenhagen and performance centers in Denmark have shown that — in 2012 exercise scientists — that muscle is the biggest organ in the body. I heard Dr. Oz say in one of his books You: The Owner’s Manual that skin is the biggest organ at 12% of the body weight. But seven years later, 2012, University of Copenhagen, they said that muscle is the biggest organ, that about half of our muscle mass has ability to release hundreds of myokines, M-Y-O-K-I-N-E-S. And people who have regular physical activity of all kinds release more of these myokines into their general circulation, which means that every organ in the body knows that you’re moving and that you’re alive. So things like interleukin 4, fibroblast growth factor 2, valstatan [sounds like 00:03:45], BDNF, brain-derived neurotrophic factor.
So people who are active, especially ones who do all three kinds of programming, which is only three percent of us — I’m saying us because I do all three — have access to these hundreds of myokines. You basically tell every organ that you’re alive from your microbiome to your brain to your kidney to your thyroid to your livers and to your sex organs.
We beat ourselves up, I know, as healthcare providers. Chairside, our bodies take a beating. Sore backs. Sore necks. Sore wrists. Sore hands. Sore butts. But exercise will help not only build mitochondria, it will tone and build lean body mass and provide to you a huge resource for you to take care of this beautiful body that we’ve been entrusted with for our journey in this lifetime around.
That’s it for my segment on my exercise. It’s medicine. It’s got a perceptive benefit. It’s great for the brain, every organ in the body, especially for you dedicated healthcare providers out there.
I’m five miles up, I’m traveling 600 miles an hour, and I’m going to be in Toronto in just a little while. But I care enough to share with you my thoughts and insights and feelings about one of my insider biohacks that keeps me doing what I do.
Michelle Strange: We hope you enjoyed this week’s TIPisode. Be sure to reach out to our guest experts and let them know how helpful their tips were. Follow A Tale of Two Hygienists on Facebook, Instagram, and head over to ataleoftwohygienists.com and subscribe to our newsletter. You can also email us at ataleoftwohygienists@gmail.com, and keep listening for more awesome content from your unofficial dental hygiene podcast.
