Promoting Healthy Lifestyles to Employees Through the #WALK30 Campaign with Dr. Roberta Schwartz

On this Inside the Texas Heart Institute Studio episode, Dr. Joseph G. Rogers sits down with the Executive Vice President & Chief Innovation Officer at Houston Methodist, Dr. Roberta Schwartz, to discuss the #WALK30 campaign.

The two will discuss:

• How to motivate your employees to exercise regularly.
• The power of competition and accountability.
• Creating Healthy Habits.

For more information regarding #WALK30, visit  texasheart.org/tag/walk30

Watch the sit-down interview here.

Watch On Demand Videos on Texas Heart TV

Visit Our Website: texasheart.org

Chapters

• 0:20 WALK30 & Motivation
• 4:44 Accountability & Integration
• 8:25 Physical Activity Tips

Transcript

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I'm Dr. Joe Rogers president and CEO of the Texas Heart Institute, and

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 I'm pleased to be joined today by Dr. Roberta Schwartz who

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 is has a PHD in

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 healthcare administration, but is the Executive

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 Vice President and chief Innovations officer at

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 Houston Methodist Hospital Roberta. Thanks for joining us today

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 Absol.

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Ute pleasure to be here

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listen, we're kicking off the the walk 30

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 campaign in Houston, and we're meeting with leaders across

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 the the community to talk

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 to them about the things that they do personally in the things that

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 they're doing in their and their work environments to

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 inspire colleagues to exercise more

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And I was really interested. I like to start with that first topic with

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 you for just a second because you were telling us just before we began

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 Taping that there's a competition.

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In your environment where people compete against

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 you to see who can take the most steps and

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 I think this might be a really interesting model for other leaders in

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 our community to take with their Workforce. Would

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 you tell us about that? Sure, we love campaigns.

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 We we work within our

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 kind of self-insured plan to encourage people

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 and to get out there and move

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 and I think it's this is

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 a part of everything that we as human beings

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 like, I mean, there's something built into us that

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 likes to show that we are just as good or

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 we stand with, you know, we stand with the

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 norm or stand out from the norm and we get

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 motivated. And so if I

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 look at this in a few areas of my life, you know and our workplace

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 we're constantly having kind of that challenge

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 you'll hear that all the time. I have

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 a mirror at home and one of

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Things that Scrolls across the bottom is everyone that's participating

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 in that class and they're constantly kind of

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 yelling out the names of people. Oh look you've joined us.

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 Here you go. Keep at it keep doing it. And I

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 I do think it's amazing that we're motivated

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 by that and what that speaks to

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 is get out there with your friends for me, you know walking with

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 my husband in the morning and in the evening not

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 only lets us get the dogs out

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 and kind of walk around the neighborhood but it also gives

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 us an opportunity to talk and catch up and really

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 speak to one another on at work

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 when they're competing against me. I am motivated

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 to make sure that I am not in an embarrassing

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 position on any one day where people look at

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 me and say oh really you just did a thousand steps. That's

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 it was easy to be. You know, I want to

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 make it so that that people have an opportunity to

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 stretch themselves.

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I think this is really interesting. We're developing a theme as

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 I've talked to other leaders in the community about making sure

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 that we're actually integrating.

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Health and walking into our lives rather than siloing

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 it and saying well, I've got this work-life balance

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 where I have to do all of these things during work and then I'm

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 going to carve out some time and I'm gonna exercise and

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 instead. I think most of the successful people seem to

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 be saying I'm somehow working this into my life. I'm I'm

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 walking with someone I care about I'm having walking meetings,

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 but but it's being built into the ethos of

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 their day and I think it's really an interesting

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 concept.

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I think if you try to just say

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 there's some people I'm always impressed. They can say like I'm

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 gonna get up at 5:30 in the morning and that's going to be my

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 exercise time and that's my time to like think and put my mind together and

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 do it. I am not that person. You will not see

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 me up happily at 5:30 in the morning. Will you

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 see me exercising at 11pm at night, which I

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Kudos and impressed everyone who can do it. That

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 is so not me. But I think if you're

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 gonna do it during the hours where you also

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 need to work and you also need to do errands and you also need to

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 do other things the question is, how do you get that exercise? Do

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 you really need to drive around the parking lot to find

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 the closest space and take 15 minutes to find that

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 closed space or can you just park in the back of the lot and use

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 that as an opportunity to get those steps that you need

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 and to do that walking that you need and same thing

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 when you do errands or other kinds of things. I

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 always kind of think to myself. Oh, it's okay. I can kind of

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 get my steps and kind of move around and get some of that exercise and I

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 agree if you don't integrate it.

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You'll do it generally for a while. If you're disciplined,

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 you'll do it forever. If you're me it will end.

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 Probably I think that's why they say gym memberships always go up

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 in January and they're done by March, right? So the answer

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 is how do you integrate it? So you can do this all year

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 long. The other thing that I think is really interesting that that

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 you brought up is this idea of

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Of sort of competitions or creating

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 teams, you know and exercising and

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 but holding each other accountable to some

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 goal and I think that with the

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 growth of social media and and

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 pulling people together sometimes not even

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 people that you know or work with but but in

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 this instance you described about you know, the scrolling across

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 the mirror. These are people that you probably don't even know that

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 are in classes across the country. This idea of holding

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 each other accountable is really it's powerful

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 and I think we're seeing more and

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 more initiatives going on around healthy eating

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 exercise and a variety of different health

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 related topics. I think it's important. I'd love to know do you

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 use that in your work environment

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 to motivate your teams to sort

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 of healthy behaviors, you know the term you

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 use which I love is motivating people. The

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 question is for humans. We need to be

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Needed you know, it is really easy to sit on the

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 couch and binge TV shows.

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The question is how do you motivate yourself to get beyond the

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 binge TV show and actually do something

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 that you know is good for you but it's

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 just not generally as much fun as

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 the thing that you would like to

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 do. It is much easier just to run through a

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 drive-through at McDonald's then it

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 is to actually go in and make a really healthy sandwich

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 or Salad right? Even though quite

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 honestly, it's equally as inexpensive to buy

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 the salad is it is to eat in McDonald's like I can

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 prove that you day in and day out but it

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 is sometimes a little bit more work. So do if doing

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 the right thing is a little bit more work

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 not a lot more work but a little bit more work. How do we

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 motivate one another to do it? And that's where

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 it is the if I'm in a class

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 if I if I have someone saying

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 it's the right thing if a doctor tells you you really do need

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 to lose that weight because if not you're gonna

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 have

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Back problems or you're going to have knee problems or guess why that's hurting,

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 you know it you have to move and and

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 I'll give you a personal story. You know, that that

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 has nothing to do with you know, my Workforce or my people are her healthy,

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 which is that we have a daughter

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 who's 19 year old with ret syndrome. And that's that

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 is a one where about 50%

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 of them are these girls are

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 basically don't walk in their wheelchair around and I credit

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 the fact that she's had somebody

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 motivating her for at least an hour a day

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 to get up and just stand and move.

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And that's why at 19 she's still

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 walking.

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And that's very unusual, but it's

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 to each their own to each their ability to each their their

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 opportunity to dangle on the

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 bed to stand up to shuffle to the kitchen to walk around

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 a very small circle to keep moving and

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 that keeps us healthy. And I

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 think whatever we have to do to motivate each other

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 that they can you can do it we have to do that. That's

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 our responsibility not only to ourselves but to

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 the ones we love it's sort of is a great lead into the last

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 question I had for you you and I spend a

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 lot of time in acute care environments with

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 people who are ill coming in with

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 with something that has led them probably

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 to be less physically active than they might otherwise be whether

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 it's an operation or an acute illness.

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But it does raise the question

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 for me about what are recommendations should be for people

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 who can't spend 30 minutes walking or

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 can't set a certain step Target

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 for a day and I can tell

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 you my Approach is to just tell people.

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Do what you can and try to increase whatever that

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 is. You're measuring in a slow methodical

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 way if you need.

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Council from you know, your physician or from

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 someone seek that counsel, but the idea is

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 just to keep moving and to keep getting a little bit better and to

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 give yourself a little bit of Grace if you're not feeling well, I'd love to

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 know kind of what you're approaches you think about this in a

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 hospital environment all the time, you know recently. I was

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 having some hip pain and went to

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 this unbelievable and PT who

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 each day just said just do a little bit more

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 just do a little bit more than you're doing right now just

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 stretch yourself just a little bit and the

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 answer wise it hurt. You know, it wasn't wasn't fun,

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 you know recovery and and

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 trying to get yourself to a place where you

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 can do the next level of whatever you

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 can.

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It's not always easy, but it's really important. And

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 so if if it is dangle on

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 the bed if it is getting a chair and eat if it

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 is just walk to the bathroom and back down again, whatever

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 it is.

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It is necessary to stretch yourself, but we get back to

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 you. It's also really helpful to have somebody who's there

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 who motivates you in the right way that

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 works for you to get you to do those things.

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Listen, I'm so appreciative that you took the time to

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 to come over today and visit with us

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 about this campaign. That's starting. I think it's going to be important and

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 has the real potential to be transformative for for

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 health in in our communities. So, thanks

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 very much again for joining us today. Thank you for having me.