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Senior Synthesis Write Up Pre Test
Senior Synthesis Write Up Pre Test
Ashley Boehm
Exercise Science Senior Synthesis: Interpretation of Results
Trainer: Ashley Boehm
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A. Resting HR Score
1. Pre-value 68 bpm
2. The resting heart rate is a very important value to know for someone. This is the number of
times that your heart beats per minute. The heart is a muscle that pumps blood that provides
the body with oxygen and nutrients that it needs. As it is doing this, it is also carrying away
any waste that there is in the body and is not used by the body. It is a crucial thing that the
body continues this and is successful with this. This number is good for a general idea for
how well the heart is pumping blood through the body while there may be no external factors
that are influencing it. Normally, a good resting heart rate is going to be between 60-100 beats
per minute. There is no specific heart rate that should be resting since everyone here can vary
from what theirs may be. Your resting heart rate can rely on what cardiovascular health you
are in. If a heart rate is significantly high or significantly low, this can point out that there may
be some sort of medical issue here. If your heart rate is also to raise or lower in either
direction without any reason to it, this could also hint to something being wrong. This heart
rate is very important because it will raise when you are working during exercise and show
3. The resting heart rate that I calculated on you is normal and within 60-100 beats per
minute. I know that before, you did not have a regular exercise regimen and normal diet, but
these can help you maintain the healthy heart rate that you have or can even improve it. You
also have chest pain with exertion, which we discovered during the bike test, so throughout
this time I hope to continue to improve your cardiovascular system to help with this pain.
2. Blood pressure is the measure of how forceful the blood is pumped from the heart and into
the arteries and the veins. Just like with heart rate, this is very important to make sure that the
heart is working normally and creating healthy blood flow throughout the body. How blood
pressure works, which you already know from being an EMT, is that there is two
measurements that are recorded. The first number is the systolic number, which is how much
pressure is being exerted against the artery walls when the heart beats. The second number is
the diastolic pressure, which reflects the pressure of the blood being exerted against the artery
walls while the heart is resting between beats sent out. A good systolic number is anything
that is less than 120, while a good diastolic number is supposed to be less than 80.
3. Your blood pressure is at a good level, so we will start exercise at a level that is good for
C. Body Composition
1. In our time together so far, we have ran through several different tests that I explained to
you as being for your body composition. What we have done in our time together has been the
Tanita scale, the skinfold testing, the waist measurement, as well as a BMI reading that I was
able to calculate from your height and weight. When wanting to improve health or see where
one might stand with their body fat, these are some of the tests that may be ran on the
individual. Although these are all good indicators of where you might stand with your body
composition, each one has their own downfall as well. For example, on the Tanita scale it may
say that you are obese, when this may not have been something that you thought you were. In
your case, you were classified as standard, which is a good place to start from. The scales and
equations do not take everything in to consideration when measuring you, so some of these
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measurements could give the wrong reading on whether someone is healthy or unhealthy. It
was important to take several body composition readings in our case so that we have a good
baseline as to where you stand before we begin our program. From this, we can compare what
your data is to the standard for your age and gender. Body composition can find us
information about fat mass as well as lean mass in the body. The fat mass is going to refer to
the essential fats in the body, while lean mass is going to refer to the muscles, organs, and
bones that are a part of the body. This essential fat that I have mentioned before is going to be
the minimal amount of fat that is going to be required in order for the body to maintain
regular functioning. The fat that is not in this category is going to be the nonessential fat.
Body composition, according to ACSM, should be in the range of 10-22% body fat for men
and 20-32% for women. These are normally the standard ranges for the two genders. Lower
then these values is considered to be low body fat, or underweight. Anything higher then these
two standards is considered overweight, and past that is obese. One of the most important
reasons to assess body compositions is that it can provide a guideline for any health issues
that could be present or become a problem in the future. With your chest pain and asthma,
factors such as body composition could be important to decreasing the problems that you are
having. Continuing to decrease body composition, in your case, can help progress your
lifestyle changes and the risk of health issues that you either already have or may develop.
You had mentioned in your write up that you want to lose weight and tone up, and this is
definitely something that we can work on! Less body fat can help with your confidence, as
143 pounds. We measured your weight to be 144 pounds on a normal scale, which
including clothes weight used on the Tanita scale, would have been correct. You had
mentioned before in your original write up that I received that you feel as if you are 20
pounds or more overweight. Although you are more towards the higher end of this
weight range, this is something that we will work on and get you more into range with.
You do not have a goal weight, but we will work to lower this as we go.
2. Body mass index is found with a calculation that works with height and weight. This
equation takes into consideration your weight in kilograms over your height in meters
squared. Once this is calculated and a number is determined, we can see where you stand
concerning body mass index. There are several different categories that you can go into
depending on this number. The first is underweight, which is any BMI that is calculated
under 18.5 kg/m2. Normal BMI is a measurement found between 18.5 kg/m2 and 24.9
kg/m2 for these readings. Although this gives a clear indication on where you stand with
body mass index, it is not always the best test for determining if someone may be healthy
or not. For example, there are many factors that this test does not take into consideration
other than height and weight. Some who could be very muscular and fit, but weight a lot
because of this can seem as if they are overweight because of where their height may be.
For your specific BMI, you were in the normal range which is something that we could
have expected. Once pairing your baseline data with what we will be doing in these next
2. For this test, I measured in inches the circumference of your waist. What I found here is
that you are 33 inches around your waist, making you score in the low risk category. This
circumference can be used as an indicator of any obesity related health risks, which you
do not need to worry about according to the test. By improving your fitness levels, we will
also improve your waist circumference and therefore continue to keep you at a low risk of
2. To determine this body composition reading, we used the Tanita scale. This takes into
consideration your body fat percentage by sending an electric signal through your body to
determine the amount of fat that you have. The test depends on the speed of the current to
go throughout your body and back out. The scale uses this by bioelectrical impedance.
The current struggles more to travel through fatty tissue, which therefore gives us a more
accurate reading on body fat from this. The scale had read that your body fat percentage is
31.5%, which classified you as standard according to the scale. With this, your fat mass
was calculated at 44.6 pounds. The ideal maximum for a standard individual is 32%, so
being close to that can motivate us to decrease this percentage throughout our work.
3. Another way that we calculated body composition was with the seven site skinfold
assessment. For this test, I measured seven different sites on your body using a skinfold
caliper. We would do two trials to make sure that the measurements I took were within 2
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millimeters of each other. From there, I was able to add together the averages of all of the
measurements and determine a body fat percentage from this. In this way, I calculated
your body fat percent to be 27%. According to ACSM guidelines, this for women puts you
at about a 25th percentile mark, rating you at poor. This means that we can work on this
percentage to lower it and improve it. I was also able to do a second equation that only
took into consideration three of the original seven sites that we measured. From this, I was
able to calculate your body fat percentage to be 32%. This puts you at the 15th percentile
mark, and rates you as very poor. Do not take this as something to get you down on
yourself, because this is something that will be improved upon during our time. The seven
site measurement gave us a better view on which body fat percentage you are more
accurately placed at, which can get us to better understanding which areas we are going to
4. We use various sites in this test to show more of the full body spectrum, rather than just
specifically upper or lower body. This shows us not only the upper half measurements, but
also the midriff and lower half measurements as well. If we were to only take
measurements on the upper half of the body, this would not give us a good indication on
5. From these body composition readings, we were able to find where it is that you might
stand on body fat percentage. We used the Tanita scale, the skinfold assessment, BMI and
waist circumference. All of these gave us pretty accurate readings to go off of in our
assessment. Out of all of the tests, I believe that for you the Tanita scale gave us the best
measurement on where you are for body fat percentage, muscle mass, and your standard
physique rating. You did not score standard in the rest of the tests, but this will come in
time. Considering all of your background on exercise, you are in pretty good shape for a
sedentary lifestyle. Once we get moving into the exercise prescription that I have planned,
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these numbers will improve as well as your overall health. Standard is a good reading to
go off of form the Tanita scale, and we will work to get your numbers here lower so that
you are farther away from the maximum measurement of standard. Because of your
31.5% fat percentage, this puts you only 0.5% away from being outside of standard. This
is something that can motivate you to get as far away from this percentage that we can get.
To look at FITT principles for this, we can work on body composition 3-5 days a week at
an intensity that is right for you. Also, this could be cardiovascular exercise for 20-30
D. Cardiovascular Fitness
health-related component of physical fitness because of the fact that low levels have been
associated with increased risk for many diseases. What we were measuring in these tests were
your maximal oxygen uptake, or what we call VO2 max. To find your VO2 max, there are
certain equations from each test that can be utilized. While preforming the tests, I was able to
track your heart rate and blood pressure to plug into equations to determine your VO2 max.
Although we may have just used the YMCA bike test and the treadmill walk test, there are
other tests that can be performed to get different readings of these. Different tests can get you
different results depending on the amount of exertion that is used in the test. For example, you
are more likely to have a higher VO2 max on a run test then you are for the treadmill walk
test. Since, as said before, you do not have a large exercise history, I decided to go with the
walk test since I knew this was something that you would be capable of performing.
Cardiovascular fitness can also be looked at as the reflection of the capabilities of the skeletal
muscles, the heart, lungs, and the blood vessels that preform work in the body. It also will
reflect the ability that there is for you to preform various exercises for certain periods of time.
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Measuring your cardiovascular fitness is a great way to monitor your health all together.
Because of this, there is many important reasons as to why we tested your cardiovascular
fitness. With the tests that were ran on you, we were able to determine where your
cardiovascular fitness stands before we start with the exercise program. I know from your past
that you do not have a lot of experience with exercise, so this is something that I hope to
improve with you as we continue forward. There were many options that we had in reason to
assess this component, but I chose the ones that would work best for you and where you come
from actively. The methods that are chosen can vary from person to person, depending on
their level of fitness. You are very motivated to continue and try to increase your
cardiovascular fitness, so this is something that we will work on. You did not like the bike
test, but you did not mind the treadmill walk test. With this, I can determine different things
2. For this test, there was a lot that was being tracked. I had you go through a warm up to
increase your heart rate to be ready for activity, as well as took your heart rate every
minute of the test and your blood pressure every second minute of the stages. Your heart
rate was in the right values to move onto the second stage, as well as to stop after this
second stage. From calculations, I was able to find your VO2 max at 25.97 ml/kg/min.
Comparing the level that I calculated you at for the walk test as well, this seems like a
pretty accurate measurement as to where your maximal oxygen level may be.
2. Based on your age and gender, your VO2 max for this test was 24.87 ml/kg/min. This was
considered very poor and rated at a 10th percentile. Although this is low, this is something
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that we can work on with our training. This was only, also, on a walk test, so your VO2
could be different in a different and more excruciating exercise. The test goes off of your
last taken heart rate, which was also lower than the rest of the test. Because of this, the
determined level could have been different if your heart rate would have remained the
same. Also, with performing the YMCA bike test before this, you could have been more
tired than you would have been starting this test first.
3. The results of both of the tests showed a lot of similarity between the to maximal oxygen
levels. These were within one unit of each other, which I find to be a pretty accurate
4. As we have talked about before, we need to focus on your cardiovascular fitness as well as
other factors in our training. The finding that we have gotten to give us good baseline data
as to where we should go next and the pace we can move at. These two tests showed that
your baseline data is “very poor”, so this is something that we will really focus on moving
forward. As we progress, I hope that you will gain more motivation to do these activities
on your own as well as after our training is over. For a FITT principle here, we will work
on cardiovascular fitness 3-5 days a week for 20-30 minutes each time. This will be at an
intensity that is right for you, as well as being a specific cardiovascular activity.
E. Muscular Fitness
1. According to ACSM, the terms of muscular strength, endurance, and power are all in the
same category of muscular fitness. Muscular strength is the muscles ability to exert a
maximal force on one single occasion. An example of this could be lifting something in
the house, or even lifting a child to carry them. On the other hand, muscular endurance is
example of this could be climbing stairs or carrying laundry to another room. Muscular
fitness is the combination of these things and is an important aspect for the overall fitness
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and health of the individual. Also included in muscular fitness is muscular power. This is
the ability of a muscle to exert force per a unit of time. For you, these are all important to
continue to work towards. These are something that we tested you on to get a baseline as
to where you stand before training. You have never played sports, and the only exercise
that you have done before coming to college was occasional work in gym class. This is
something that I am really eager to work on and improve with you. Things such as
deadlifts that you admire so much would be under muscular fitness, and I intend to teach
2. Pre-values:
3. Overall in this section, you did fairly decent. For the sit up test, you scored average which
is good. For the grip strength test you had scored poor, which is nothing that cannot be
worked on. We can work on this through different grip strength exercises, such as forearm
exercises. Your push up score was fair, which you did fairly well considering being shown
the correct form and how to do one correctly before the test. Overall, your muscular
fitness can improve, which we knew coming into this. This is something that we have
4. With the different exercises that I plan on taking you through, your muscular fitness will
definitely improve throughout. Coming from not being active or exercising consistently
can be hard to score good on baseline tests. Come the end of our sessions, we will
improve these measurements. Without doing these exact exercises, we can work on
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multiple different ones that will still improve your overall performance in the ones that
you will be tested on again at the end. Something that you were wanting to get out of this
training was toning your body, which will occur after exercising your muscular fitness.
Other factors will go into this as well, but I plan to work on this factor just a bit more than
the rest since this is something you want to be able to do but you were never taught the
correct way. Also knowing the correct form for each of these will help to improve your
strength even more. For the FITT principle here, we will work on muscular fitness 2-3
days a week for 20-60 minutes each time. During these days, we will target specific areas
F. Flexibility
1. Flexibility is the ability to move a joint through its complete range of motion. It is
important for all of us as we preform our activities of daily living. Flexibility goes into a lot
more then we think throughout our day. From bending over to pick something up, to anything
that you may preform that can be athletic, flexibility is always important. This is something
that may get overlooked as not as important as the rest, but it is definitely important in our
training. By becoming more flexible, you will see a difference in your performance on
anything that you might be doing throughout the day and it will even feel easier to do these
things.
when reaching behind your back. This is why it is also referred to as the back scratch.
With an overlap to your fingers, this is measured as a passed test. If there were to be a gap
between your fingers, I would measure this gap and this would be a failed test. Since you
were able to overlap your fingers, I could count these both as passed tests and an overlap
3. Since you did pass these tests, we will continue to work on your flexibility in this area.
Flexibility is not something that you mentioned wanting to improve, but after these tests it
is definitely something that we can look to work on throughout our practice. For the FITT
principle here, we will work on flexibility after exercise most days. This will include
stretching for about 10 minutes after the cool down from the exercise. We are working on
your flexibility a lot to improve, so we will stretch most of the body each and every day to
Age:
o Only 21
Family history:
o No family history
Cigarette smoking:
o Current cigarette smoker or those who quit within the previous 6 months
Physical inactivity:
o Non-active
Obesity:
o Body mass index of 30 kgm2 or greater or waist girth greater than 102
Hypertension:
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Dyslipidemia:
lowering medication
o Unknown
Diabetes:
o Unknown
o Unknown
Based on the lack of risk factors that my client shows, she does not need a physician clearance
before entering an exercise program. One concern that I have for her is that she does have chest
pain with exertion, which she experienced during the YMCA test. Her asthma can also be
concerning, but when she brings her inhaler it is something that we did not have to worry about.
We will monitor chest pain as we go, as well as check on any problems with breathing if it ever
becomes one.
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My patient does not have any injuries that should be alarming or hold her back from exercise of
any kind. The only things that we will have to monitor, as said before, is the chest pain she
experiences as well as her asthma. She has other complications, such as depression and anxiety,
but after talking through this with her, she should be fine to complete exercise activities with
these problems. Although the problems that my client has, she is not on any major prescriptions
that would cause specific side effects and mess with anything we will be doing. My client did get
dizzy after the YMCA bike test and had to rest for a little before being able to complete any
other activities. This was alarming, considering how she was rating herself of the RPE scale
beforehand. I was able to talk her through it and let her rest after until she got to full capacity to
My client was very interested in everything that we were doing with her. She had a question for
most things, but I was able to answer these to the fullest of my abilities from what I have learned
in my major so far. She is excited to get to become active and be shown how to get there as well.
She definitely learned a lot from what we were doing, considering she knew little to nothing
about exercise before this. Some questions that she was most concerned about was how she was
doing or how well she was scoring after a test. I was able to tell her that it is something I will
work on at a later time, but also something that she will be seeing and going over as well. She
would also have specific questions on the tests and how and why they were ran the way that they
are, which I was easily able to explain to her in detail. My client and I are the same age, so it is
easy to relate with her and be on the same page with everything.
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1. Cardiovascular Fitness
improvement
improvement
Recommendations:
Since cardiovascular fitness is a reflection of the functional capacity of the heart, the lungs and
the blood vessels and how they work, this is something that we will work a lot on. We will do a
lot of cardiovascular fitness training to improve your levels of fitness as well as reduce any pain
while exercising. We will start slow, since you do not have much training in this.
2. Muscular Fitness
Test: one minute bent knee sit up test Score: 25 (Average) x Strength
Improvement
Improvement
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Recommendations:
Overall, your muscular fitness was not terrible. It is definitely something that we can work
towards improving and showing you how to do the correct form for new exercises. Muscular
fitness is something that you have never really worked on because of not knowing what to do, so
we will really focus on getting the form down and getting you where you need to be so that we
3. Flexibility
Improvement
Recommendations:
As a whole, your flexibility tests were not the best tests that you had performed in. The sit and
reach was a struggle for you, so this is something to work towards and make a goal for. We can
work towards better flexibility for you by working in body stretches throughout our training.
4. Body Composition
Improvement
Improvement
improvement
Recommendations:
You had mentioned many times in your write up that losing weight would be something that you
are very interested in. Although you did not know what would be a healthy weight to lose, you
were still interested in as much as you can do. We can target specific exercises to help you
improve your overall body composition. Strength training, cardiovascular exercises, endurance
training and many more can all improve your body composition. Ideally, I would love to help
you lose weight and get in shape, which is the ultimate goal of this program! You also would like
motivation to continue to do these things, which we will find as we continue along in the
program.