Doing nothing may be hazardous to your health

Doing nothing may be hazardous to your health– it could even kill you. This is the belief of a growing number of physiologists who feel that the sedentary lifestyles embraced by many Americans could be placing them at risk for SeDS (Sedentary Death Syndrome), a condition that may be responsible for disability and premature deaths among a large segment of the population.

Coined by Frank Booth, a research physiologist at the University of Missouri at Columbia, SeDS is a term that identifies the possible connection between a physically inactive lifestyle and a list of chronic, preventable diseases such as type II diabetes, breast cancer, colon cancer and heart attacks.

Recently, Booth and about 40 of his colleagues took time out from the annual meeting of the American College of Sports Medicine in Baltimore to visit Washington, D.C., to talk to reporters and Congressional staff members about SeDS.

Joining Booth was Ronald Gomes, a Delaware Biotechnology Institute fellow and National Research Service Award fellow working as a limited term researcher in Department of Biological Sciences.

"I was one of seven researchers asked to prepare a brief sound bite for the media regarding physical inactivity and chronic disease," Gomes said. "I chose to talk about our nation's children, their increased physical inactivity and the alarming rise in obesity and type II diabetes among the young."

Type II diabetes, which affects about 95 percent of the 16 million Americans with diabetes, is a metabolic disorder caused by the body's inability to make and use insulin in sufficient amounts.

While there appears to be a genetic link among causes, it often takes another factor, such as obesity, to bring on the disease, which usually strikes adults age 45 and older, Gomes said.

According to the National Institute for Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Disorders and the American Diabetes Association, type II diabetes is nearing epidemic status because of the growing number of older persons and the widespread evidence of obesity and sedentary lifestyles among all age groups.

From 1982 to 1994, incidents of type II diabetes increased 10-fold, Gomes said, and in 1994 more than one-third of all newly diagnosed cases of the disease occurred in patients between 10 and 19 years of age.

"Perhaps the greatest tragedy is the appearance of 'adult-associated' diseases in our children," Gomes said. "The trends are striking and the long term outlook is frightening because these types of ailments drastically decrease the quality of life for young people."

Gomes noted that between 1998-1999 there was a 6 percent rise in obesity among all age groups.

While the press conference may have helped to open a national dialog on SeDS, Gomes and his colleagues took advantage of their visit to petition legislators to at least retain or hopefully increase funding levels for the physical activity and nutrition programs sponsored by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

While legislators seemed to be aware of recent trends in chronic diseases, Gomes said they were for the most part surprised that the National Institute of Health (NIH) is doing little to support research in the area of disease prevention.

"With the NIH budget set to double over the next few years, everyone assumes that disease prevention is at the top of the list, but it's not," Gomes said. "Because SeDS research interrelates all organ systems in the intact body, HIH is not supportive."

In an effort to change this perception, he said SeDS supporters plan to use molecular and genetic research to help establish any biological links that may exist between physical inactivity and chronic disease.

"Biological research should also be coupled with new research into the behavioral and epidemiological components of SeDS," Gomes said. "At present, more medical-based evidence analogous to the biological research linking smoking to cancer is needed."

Gomes first began his association with Booth while writing his doctoral dissertation on skeletal muscle weakness associated with aging at the University of Texas Health Science Center and M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston in 1998.

Since coming to UD as a postdoctoral fellow, Gomes has been involved with the study of cartilage development at the cellular and molecular level and is currently working on a tissue-engineering effort with researchers from UD's composite materials group.

The project, which began with support from Delaware Biotechnology Institute, should permit researchers to eventually progress from cell culture experiments to testing on animal and human subjects.

Gomes, who earned his undergraduate degree in physiological psychology at the University of California at San Diego, holds a master's degree in kinesiology from the University of California at Berkeley and a doctorate in integrative biology/ physiology from the University of Texas Health Science Center and M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston.

He said his career plans include working in the area of cartilage and skeletal muscle regeneration in aging, while possibly combining such efforts with additional research on cartilage development.

"In my mind there is a common thread linking these two seemingly different areas," Gomes said. "That link holds the potential to improve the quality of life for people."

–Jerry Rhodes