PhD student Negin Riazi guest blogged about the new 24-Hour Movement Guidelines for Children and Youth on Obesity Panacea – a blog written by two obesity researchers, Peter Janiszewski, PhD, and Travis Saunders, PhD, CEP. To read more, check out Guidelines! What are they good for?
2016 ParticipACTION Report Card & New Paper Out Now!
The 2016 ParticipACTION Report Card reports that only 9% of Canadian children (5-17 years) are meeting the recommended 60 min of daily MVPA. In response, experts have developed the 24-Hour Movement Guidelines for Children and Youth which incorporate physical activity, sedentary behaviour and sleep. Dr. Guy Faulkner was a consensus panel member developing the guidelines and a Report Card Research Committee member.
Dr. Faulkner and PhD student Negin Riazi were involved in a study examining stakeholders’ perceptions regarding the clarity of, level of agreement with, and perceived importance of these new Movement Guidelines. Read more…
Hear Dr. Faulkner talk about the new guidelines on CTV News Vancouver.
Congratulations Dr. Carly Priebe!
Congratulations to Carly Priebe for taking 1st place at the PDA’s Annual 3 minute PostDoc Slam on May 26th! Dr. Priebe presented her work with Run to Quit, a 10-week smoking cessation program where participants receive practical support on quitting smoking and also train to run a 5K.
Congratulations Dr. Eli Puterman
Congratulations to Dr Eli Puterman, a recipient of the Michael Smith Foundation for Health Research 2016 Scholar Award.
Foundation funding will allow for the successful realization of Dr Puterman’s vision that maximizes capacity to improve the health of Canada’s adult populations who are at risk for accelerated aging and disease development.
Congratulations to PhD Student Mark Duncan!
Congratulations to Mark Duncan for receiving the AMS Impact Grant for his project, “Examining the feasibility of exercise as an intervention for students seeking help for depression and anxiety: Engaging stakeholders in the development of a tailored and sustainable intervention”
Dr. John Kramer featured on Roundhouse Radio 98.3
Roundhouse Radio 98.3 Vancouver
Our City with Kirk LaPointe – Dr. John Kramer (Apr 19, 2016)
Kirk speaks with Dr. John Kramer, Principal Investigator at ICORD, about the recent research from Ohio State University that shows movement in the hands of people with paralysis caused by spinal cord injury using recordings from the brain.
http://cirh.streamon.fm/listen-pl-2463
Miscisco, Dan
Brunswick Georgia! These were the very first words heard by a small gathering of baseball aficionados – words exclaimed with gusto. This was Dan Miscisco, UBC Phys. Ed grad of 1967 announcing the presentation of his experiences as a pro baseball player. It was this small Georgia town that happened to be his first stop on a short but sweet baseball career.
Miscisco grew up in Vancouver and as he finished high school displayed enough talent as a pitcher to be signed by the St. Louis Cardinals. He pitched both in Brunswick and in Winnipeg where he roomed with a future Cardinal and Hall of Famer, Steve Carlton.
Dan tells his stories today with inordinate passion emphasizing to the extreme certain words. His highly active mind sometimes runs ahead of him spiked with off-the-charts intensity. Despite the success he had as a pitcher however, he decided his future was to further his education. So coming back to Vancouver he graduated from UBC but while taking classes also found time to play baseball for the Thunderbirds under legendary coach Frank Gnup.
Since attaining his degree Dan taught and coached on the lower mainland inspiring students with his passion and unconventional delivery of his messages. Coaching basketball and volleyball are his specialties which culminated in his induction into the British Columbia Basketball Hall of Fame as a builder.
Despite his baseball memories which he so willingly shares, deciding that UBC and teaching would ultimately become his future proved to be a smart decision.
Written by Fred Hume
Nickle, Lisa
Despite her spirited Hall of Fame basketball career which included leading UBC in scoring four of her five years, Lisa Nickle recalls, “Its really the people who are ingrained in my memories.” Lisa graduated from Kinesiology in 1994 at the beginning of UBC’s recent success in women’s basketball – some of this success due to her. Her dedication, work ethic and love of the game all of which UBC provided the opportunity for her to showcase, translated into several UBC basketball records and as of 2016, ten still stand or are shared. And it was an emotional evening for Lisa in 2004 when she was honoured at the Big Block banquet as an inductee in the UBC Sports Hall of Fame.
Since graduation, Lisa, now married with a family, has been a teacher and coach in the Okanagan most recently a learning assistance teacher at a Kelowna elementary school. Her goal while at UBC was to teach physical education to special needs youngsters.
Described by UBC coach Deb Huband as a “feisty dynamo who led by example and got the most out of her potential”, Lisa expressed upon her graduation, “The game has given me such great gifts in life. I’ll never be able to give back as much as I’ve received, but I’d like to do as much as I can.”
Written by Fred Hume
Concussion management app developed by UBC Kinesiology Master’s student Harrison Brown
A concussion management app, Head Check Health, has been developed by a UBC Master of Kinesiology graduate and PhD candidate, Harrison Brown.
Along with cofounders Kerry Costello — chief operating officer and recent MBA graduate from UBC — and Alexey Manov — manufacturing and operations manager and another recent UBC graduate — Brown hopes to enhance sports safety by making concussion data more readily available and easier for medical professionals to analyze.
The team also aims to increase concussion data accuracy by eliminating the human error currently involved in testing players’ balance. According to the team, concussion testing and management technology is very specialized.
There are three areas that need to be tested for a Gold Standard concussion test, a test which meets the requirements set and upheld by major sports organizations, from the IOC to the NHL.
Memory is tested by players’ recollection of a random set of words, cognition tests, concentration and awareness of players’ surroundings, while balance is tested via performance in balance exercises.
In contrast, Head Check Health is an all-in-one.
The app allows coaches, doctors and athletic trainers to gather data from all three tests in one place and analyze it on the spot — something that was previously impossible because of the unavailability of data.
The team noted that teams do not have dedicated trainers, doctors or even coaches for extended periods of time, especially at the amateur level which represents the vast majority of players.
Currently, balance is tested by medical professionals observing players perform balance exercises. There is a lot of room for human error in these tests, something Head Check hopes to remedy.
“It becomes basically a human error compounded onto another human error,” said Manov.
To address this, Head Check Health uses a proprietary headband to measure players’ sense of balance using high-sensitivity triple-axis accelerometers, which quantify movement of the players’ heads in 3D space during balance exercises. The headbands pair with the app to deliver accurate, quantitative data.
The team is currently in the beta trials of the app with 31 different schools’ varsity teams. They are prototyping a second version of the headband with better sensors and a more comfortable strap which will begin testing it in the coming weeks. With little competition producing both a headband and app of similar comprehensiveness, Head Check Health aims to eventually expand to service all sports players’ concussion management needs.
“Long term, what we want to do is have widespread adoption of [Head Check Health] across all sports, all age groups, all countries,” said Brown.
© 2016 The Ubyssey
Hansen, Rick
Rick Hansen remains one of UBC’s most renowned graduates as the 1986 Physical Education alumnus’ story has been so well documented. But because this man decided to take on challenges rather than avoid them, fight self-pity and despair and because of his resulting motivational and fund-raising accomplishments, we sometimes overlook the fact Rick was one of Canada’s most remarkable athletes.
Prior to entering UBC Rick, a good athlete in his home town of Williams Lake, was involved in an auto accident which left him with a broken spine. Rick’s immense resolve and fortitude paved the way for him to continue his athletic career as a wheelchair basketball and volleyball player playing on several national champion teams, in both sports. At the same time he showcased his abilities on the track, particularly in middle and long distances. In the first Paralympic Games in 1980 Hansen won a silver medal in the 5000M and the following year won gold in the Canadian Marathon. In 1982 he won eight gold medals and set records at the first ever Pan American Games for disabled athletes.
Rick represented Canada and UBC well at the 1984 Olympics by reaching the final in the 1500M and also that year captured gold at the London Wheelchair Games marathon. He was three times named Canada’s Physically Disabled Athlete of the Year and joined Wayne Gretzky no less, as 1983 co-winner of the Lou Marsh Award, the pinnacle of accolades for our athletes.
Since concluding his storied athletic career he has embarked upon motivating those who are disabled, in fact everyone, raising awareness of the accomplishments and potential of the disabled stressing what they can do rather than what they can’t do. Induction into several Halls of Fame and the Order of Canada are among the testaments to his life’s work. In Rick’s words, “We have made great strides in spinal cord injury research (and) quality of life improvement . . . which have made our country the global standard.”
Rick was recently featured as one of Education’s 100 as part of the UBC Faculty of Education’s Year of Alumni celebrations.
Written by Fred Hume, UBC Historian