Archives for February 2017

February 21, 2017 By Anusha Subramanian Leave a Comment

Sports for Social Inclusion

“Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do”—– John Wooden

GOQii supports Social Premier League (SPL)

Sports they say is a great leveller. It can bring the privileged and the underprivileged on the same platform to compete with each other in true spirit. Sports can very well be used as a tool for social inclusion and to bring about a social change. Some anecdotal evidence suggests that when applied correctly, sport can create bridges where boundaries usually exist, giving participants a lesson in teamwork, empathy for their teammates and respect for their opponents. It helps develop a strong sense of morality; and the development of an appreciation of diversity.

Sport is clearly not just about competition and exercise, but also regulates behaviour and creates a feeling of belonging, which in turn leads to the strengthening of democracy.

Singing Footsteps Foundation (SFF), is one such organisation in Patna, Bihar that is trying to bring about a social change through sports. The organisation started by Toni Sharma, a professor at NIFT and currently pursuing PhD (ECONOMICS) at IIT aims at bringing about true equality in human lives as well as balance in the ecology, using sports as the driving force to bring together the youth and achieve the social balance.

Sharma is a strong proponent of an egalitarian society, a philanthropist and a social activist at heart. He also mentors startups and advises various incubation centres. His idea with SFF is to showcase and effectively address the most burning and plaguing issues of our society at a large scale, on a single platform.

He says, “Our vision is to bring about social change by harnessing the power of youth and sports. We are constantly focusing on social changes through innovative strategies. We believe in the intent backed by invention”.

So what does SFF do with sports? It has started a league cricket game called ‘Social Premier League’ (SPL), to bring together the virtues of sports to fight the inequities of the society.SPL is a cricket tournament involving the entire youth and corporate fraternity to effectively spread the message of social integration and awareness. It is an initiative that endeavours to bring together the youth from all backgrounds in a relaxed and natural environment that are ideal for harnessing the power of sports to engage communities and change lives.

This year’s SPL that was held at the beginning of this month included Autorickshaw drivers, slum children and, girls and boys of premier colleges.

By way of the cricket tournament, SFF has been able to bring about a behavioural change among the auto drivers such as being more responsible on the road, minimising honking etc. “We have seen a tremendous change in the attitude of the auto drivers since they have been playing this tournament. They have developed empathy and we realised that we can create awareness about lots of issues along with them. If we enable them with the right tools they can help us in disseminating information and creating awareness,” says Sharma.

As participation in the league tournament, each of the auto drivers teams was also asked to pick a social cause that they would like to create awareness about. The two issues that the auto drivers were keen on creating awareness about was Cancer and Malnutrition. They carried messages on these issues in their auto.

SFF is now working towards a financial inclusion of these auto drivers by opening bank accounts for them and after this, they will conduct health check-ups for their children and family as a whole.

According to Sharma, “Sports is the most powerful and the only stimulus in the world that can help build a positive attitude, instil fearlessness and leads to significant overall development.”

“We believe that to make a significant contribution we need to employ the best of youth to uplift those at the lowest rung of the society. We believe in concentrating on the weakest. We believe in mutually beneficial relations that help us raise resources in a way that others can’t. And yes, we don’t settle for the second spot, in order to give the best to those who need our help the most,” Sharma concludes.

As a company, GOQii has been supporting several causes through its Karma Platform. As part of our ongoing efforts to do good karma in the society and get our players to do the same. Supporting SPL and SFF is one such initiative in this direction. GOQii believes that giving to others gives an inner happiness to one while also improving one’s own health.

February 21, 2017 By Anusha Subramanian Leave a Comment

Know your HeartBeat

Heart disease has been a leading cause of death for both men and women. Bad lifestyle is one the main reasons for people developing heart ailments at a young age.It’s remarkable that heart attacks are so common and cause so much pain (emotional and physical) disability when they can more often than not be prevented.

The good news is that people are getting aware of the risks of a bad lifestyle leading to many taking to fitness and indulging in activities such as running. They have become more conscious of their well-being and their bodies. With the heart being one of the most vital organs, they at every juncture are keen to monitor their heart rate.

What is heart rate? Heart rate is the number of heartbeats per unit of time. Simply put, it is also how well your heart is able to pump oxygenated blood.

Keeping in mind the above factors and also as a part of extending their services, GOQii, one of the leading health ecosystem and preventive healthcare platform has launched its latest service offering-GOQii Heart Care which focuses on cardiovascular health.The key feature of this service is its ability to connect consumers to cardiovascular specialists through the GOQii application and a new GOQii tracker which has capabilities to monitor heart rate.

Today, there are so many devices generating huge data most of which is essentially junk if not analysed and acted upon. “When we launched the GOQii service, we launched it precisely with personal coaching so that the user is aware of the data and the coach can help him or she follow a routine and lifestyle based on that data. Similarly, the GOQii Heart Care is a one-stop solution that tracks and analyses data generated by the Heart Rate trackers and can connect the GOQii user to the GOQii doctor who can help make sense of the data. It is a unique offering as compared to any other wearable device or service available in the market,” says Vishal Gondal, CEO, GOQii.

To use this new feature, all that the GOQii users have to do is share their health and heart rate data via the new GOQii tracker with the GOQii Doctor for his analysis. The doctor will go through this data and provide specific inputs to the users on how to maintain good heart health. In specific cases, if required the GOQii doctor will refer the user to a cardiac specialist at Max Hospital and other partner hospitals. GOQii has partnered with max Hospitals.

The constant rise of cardiovascular cases across the globe was one of the primary reasons behind the development of this specialised offering. With this new service, GOQii aims to create the world’s leading health eco-system which connects the GOQii users to leading professionals in the fitness and healthcare space. Having said that, the heart care service is not a replacement for a regular doctor and does not apply to any emergency medical or chronic situations.

Consumers can upgrade their existing wearable devices with the new service as well. With regards to third party hardware which includes the Heart Rate Monitor, consumers can avail of the service by paying a nominal consultation fee. The services along with the new GOQii Heart Rate tracker will be available at a subscription Rs 2999 for 6 months and 3999 for 12 months respectively.

February 17, 2017 By Dr Darshana Salve 2 Comments

Blood should circulate – Donate Blood!

We only understand the importance of blood donation when someone close to us is in need of it. A few days back my cousin contacted me to know the availability of blood for her friend’s father who met with an accident. Unfortunately, we lost him due to excess blood loss. We know of this incident because it’s a dear friend’s father but, on a daily basis there are so many such cases where there is loss of death due to non-availability of blood.

Statistics show that roughly every year in India there are 234 million major operations, 63 million trauma-induced surgeries, 31 million cancer-related procedures and 10 million pregnancy related complications which require blood transfusions.

Apart from these there are also disorders like sickle cell anemia, thalassemia and hemophilia that require repeated blood transfusions.

One of the main reasons for lack of blood is, many people are skeptical about blood donation. They have fears of contracting infections during blood donation, fear of the needle or feeling weak after blood donation. Human body approximately has 4.7-5.5 L of blood, out of it only 350/ 450 ml of blood is withdrawn during blood donation drives and it takes only a day or two to replenish the fluid volume in the body and three months for the regeneration of red cells to donate more blood.

There is no substitute for human blood. Blood cannot be manufactured – it can only come from
volunteer donors like you and me. One blood donation can save 3 lives. But, unfortunately only 1 % of volunteer donors come forward to donate blood and majority of the blood donation comes from replacement donors.

Replacement donors are friends and relatives of a patient who donate blood as replacement for the blood given to the patient.

At times, these replacement donors (friends and relatives) are more likely to harm the recipients by hiding or overlooking the many don’ts of donation.

Though voluntary self-referral to donate without citing reasons is widely accepted, replacement donors rarely adhere to it either to hide their high-risk behavior or due to pressure to meet the immediate demand for certain units of blood. As a result, the prevalence of HIV, hepatitis B, and hepatitis C is much higher among family donors when compared to voluntary donors, according to a 2012 study published in the Asian Journal of Transfusion Science.

Donation of safe blood can be achieved only when replacement donors are replaced by healthy volunteer donors to meet ‘over 95 per cent of blood requirement’. This can be done through increased awareness, providing appropriate facilities for people to donate blood, and improved donor retention.

While donating blood always be truthful about your health status!

Do not donate blood if you have any of these conditions

Cold / fever in the past 1 week.
Under treatment with antibiotics or any other medication.
Cardiac problems, hypertension, epilepsy, diabetes (on insulin therapy), history of cancer, chronic kidney or liver disease, bleeding tendencies, venereal disease etc.
Major surgery in the last 6 months.
Vaccination in the last 24 hours.
Miscarriage in the last 6 months or have been pregnant / lactating in the last one year.
Had fainting attacks during last donation.
Have regularly received treatment with blood products.
Shared a needle to inject drugs/ have history of drug addiction.
Had sexual relations with different partners or with a high risk individual.
Tested positive for antibodies to HIV.
If you are Underweight ( below 50 KGs)

Pregnancy and Menstrual Cycle

Females should not donate blood during pregnancy and lactation.
Females should not donate blood if they are having heavy menstrual flow or menstrual cramps.

Do donate blood if…

You are between age group of 18-60 years.
Weight is 50 kgs or more.
Hemoglobin is 12.5 gm% minimum.
Last blood donation was 3 months earlier.
You are healthy and have not suffered from malaria, typhoid or other transmissible disease in the recent past.

It’s time that we take up the responsibility to do voluntary blood donation. Donate Blood without waiting for a call.

February 15, 2017 By Champ Alreja 3 Comments

How accurate is the GOQii band

In the last one-year fitness trackers or wearable as they are called have grown in popularity. But, yet there is a lot of confusion around how accurate are these trackers when it comes to counting steps. One is not sure if they can trust the numbers that are captured by the tracker.

Today, almost every second person is wearing a fitness tracker to monitor his or her health and fitness levels on a day-to-day basis. I am constantly flooded with questions of how accurate is the band when it comes to monitoring the level of physical activity during a 30-minute workout session or while running or trekking in the outdoors?

These questions have prompted me to write this blog on how the steps are counted and how accurate is the band.

Let me begin with the first question

1) Why does my band count steps when I ride my bike or when I sit in an auto?

A fitness band is a sophisticated and modern version of an analogue pedometer. In a digital form using complex algorithms and an accelerometer (an instrument for measuring the acceleration of a moving or vibrating body). Fitness bands such as the GOQii, are designed to measure 3 axis movements of your body by being worn on your wrist.

The band counts steps on the principle of movements in a certain direction and velocity which are programmed using Japanese algorithms. Hence, movements in a certain pattern and pace are tracked as steps.

The band uses predictive equations using your body’s acceleration in different directions to estimate energy expenditure.

Let me explain how it works…

Velocity and Direction

If you are walking too slow or running too fast it will not pick it up. On an average, you need to walk -200 steps per minute.

According to University of Nebraska researchers who examined various fitness monitors (Jawbone, Fitbit, Nike Fuel Band, and Actigraph), accelerometer-based monitors can overestimate or underestimate energy expenditure by 10-15 percent, depending on the monitor.

2. Talking to our players and users of other fitness bands, they often tell me that while jogging, running or playing a sport, the tracker doesn’t show the exact distance.

How does the device measure distance? I am often told by players that they have gone for a jog and taken 10 rounds of a jogging track that measures 400 mts in length but, the GOQii band has clocked only 3.5 km instead of 4 km. How is that possible?

The device measures motion. Distance is an algorithmic calculation based on estimations of your average stride length x the number of steps taken. A person who is 5’6” tall has an average stride length of 0.7 meters. Hence, 100 steps taken will show as 70 meters. When you run, your stride length increases above average and when you jog, it falls below average.

GOQii’s main service offering being lifestyle change calculates distance based on your day and not on particular activities. So, during certain activities you may lose or gain steps, however, the average for the day is well indicated.

Stride Length Pics velocity 50 steps/ minute-160 steps/per minute

3. I have been walking a lot but, my band only shows minimalistic steps.

Running on a treadmill, cycling, swimming and playing certain sports may not accurately display your steps taken. Such as, while cycling, your hands stationery and placed on the handlebars, the tracker being designed to detect motion will pick up steps from your stationery hands. Similarly, you may experience the same while pushing a stroller or a bag. In many cases, you can put the core unit in your pocket (instead of your wrist) to record motion, especially, when your hands are still.

Hand swing motion

Images Courtesy of The Progress Group, Analog Dialogue.

Here’s a short video of GOQii being put on an apparatus in a testing lab to test accuracy