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Recovery of Nurses legs using anenvironmentally friendly recoverysystem

I do a porters job in a hospital, and at the weekends I work with long distance athletes as arecovery specialist -see websitewww.aching-legs.org There is a major difference between the athletes and the nurses-the athletes train for what theydo and they have recovery strategies after they have trained and competedAsk a nurse what sport or activity they participate in away from work for fitness andrelaxation, and the chances they will tell you none because they are too tired to take part inanything except resting up on their days off work This is not surprising as when the distance they may have covered in a shift at the hospital isadded up it could be many miles (or kilometers) and it could be the equivalent of a marathon orhalf marathonNurses do not see themselves as athletes, and most of them would not even consider going infor a fun run or marathon or half marathon, but on an average day would cover nearly thisdistance on their feet anywayA difference between the marathoner and nurse is that the marathon runners will have had atleast a week to recover after their race, the nurse will be back doing their race the next day orsooner if they have a short turnaround between shift changesAnother difference is that while the marathon athlete probably has a recovery strategy in placeto get over the distance, the nurse while having medical knowledge to deal with patients,probably has no knowledge on how to recover their own legs-they have no recovery strategy tohelp them go back to work with fresh legs

There are some similarities between nurse and athlete

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Muscle soreness

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Tight calves

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Aching feet

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Low back ache

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Upper shoulders sore

•

Dragging feet as fatigue takes effect

Nurses know how to take care of other peoples bodies better than their own, they drink alcoholand smoke, they may have short turnarounds between shift without having recovered properly,and go back to do it all againBoth nurses and athletes have similar problems in recovery, but the athlete is more aware of how to recover after an event than a nurse is aware of how to recover after a shift-

•

They do a warm up and stretching before competition

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They do a cool down and stretch after competing

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Swollen ankles

These swollen ankles are mine after I was testing out a theory on long flights but it is a fair betthat many nurses have them like this at the finish of

their

dayWhen you are on your feet all day the calf muscles start to fatigue, power stops being suppliedto the pump and the blood just pools around the ankles-the water (or lymph fluid) separatesfrom it and migrates into the tissues in and around the ankles-so they swellAs it is not being pumped away fast enough from the lower legs, the ankles swell or haveedemaRecovery from swollen feet and ankles does not come just with just sitting down resting at thenurses station and hoping they will go away-all this does is to leave the fluid in the lower legsand lets the muscles cool down-the muscles in the back of the legs sitting position shorten andon standing it is difficult to walk properly as the legs are not straight

Like these guys who have just run for 3 days they stand up they can barely move!

These are 2 people who have just been running for 3 days around a running track in allweathers and they have aching legsThe professional athlete’s career for all their care only lasts a few years, the nurse is hoping fora career that will last for years without any ongoing self-maintenance, they should realize thatunlike like a cars tyres which when they wear out they can be changed, the nurses legs whenthey wear out can’t be(to find out what can go wrong with the legs seewww.hazards.org/standing

)

If the nurse wishes to have as long a career as the athletes is short, they shouldmake some changes to their maintenance routine

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There are 2 major groups of options to relieve aching legsThese are

passive

and

active

AchingLeg Relief

The relief of aching legs can be approached in different ways and the decision of which way togo is dependent on a number of factors-the biggest one being what other commitments youhave in your life at that present time and the time you have to commit to it

PassiveRelief

The

‘passive’

option is the most recommended way to relieve aching legsFind a quiet area and lie down with the legs elevated to let the fluid flow back

(Been there-done that-didn’t seem to work too well-I was stiff when I stood upand went light headed)

That like the ultra marathon runners and walkers nurses do not have time to wait forpassive recovery to work at relieving those aching legs-the active option is betterUltra Athletes

Ultra athletes cover a lot of ground, like nurses they are on their feet for many hours and theirlegs get fatigued-they suffer from sore feet, sore legs, swollen ankles, stiffness, wastedmuscles, muscle cramps, tiredness, mental fatigue, restless legs, sore skin, night pains, musclespasm, muscle wastage, swollen ankles, hyperthermia, hypothermia, temper tantrums,vomiting, food sensitivity, allergies, rashes, loss of judgement-and that is the good partThe runner in the red shirt had been going for 4 hours when fatigue hit him; he was discoveredat the side of the track lying down unable to move-here you see him 20 minutes later up andmoving againHow was he able to get going so quickly and obviously happy because he got on the track again and was able to finish the event?