Interesting story and thoughtful perspectives as always, Paul.
Health care training for elderly and research on exercise and aging sounds great. I do think it a good idea to "earmark" what one wants, to at least some extent. I also think that these are precisely the type of things universities should spend more time/money on. Since big pharma money has 0 interest in "Workout as Medicine", although it has massive and measurable impact on all kinds of things such as depression, anxiety, stress, obesity, aging, both physical and mental – and 0 side effects (indeed, strongly positive side effects, even!) – someone else need to fund it. Universities seem like the places for it. (I do know that one Swedish doctor & psychologist, Anders Hansen, has dedicated his career to researching and writing popular science books on this topic, with great success.)
One other field where lots of research is needed, is the science of sleep. Here, too, people seem to be making advances. Also, the link between exercise and (good) sleep is very interesting to me.
There are so many fields which seem under-researched &/ under-funded. Fields which aren't even "fields" yet, although oftentimes (as those mentioned above), they are things that we all do in our daily lives (or should do, anyway).
PS. As a side note, I spoke to someone who is one sick leave with stress related stuff just yesterday. We both agreed how much being in the forest or nature generally helps with that. She told me how she had previously felt it almost taboo to just go out wandering in nature, but since people have begun talking about it as being a form of therapy, she felt it was less weird, and had now begun doing it more. So societal approval, and not least the stamp of approval from universities, might help there. |
