“Our results suggest that harnessing smart technology into clinical efforts could catalyze behavioral changes that have the potential to reduce disease risk and shape health,” says senior study investigator Michael Blaha, M.D., M.P.H. People in the text-message group increased their total activity time by 21 minutes a day, on average, and aerobic time by 13 minutes on average, compared with the other two groups. Overall, 81 percent of those in the text-message group reached their 10,000-steps-a-day goal, compared with 44 percent of people in the other two groups. Those who received text messages took, on average, 2,534 more steps per day, compared with people who didn’t get texts nudging them to move more and an average 3,376 more than patients in the control group. Your exercise prescription for tonight is 3,878 steps.” Those who remained well below received encouraging or booster messages such as “ Jane, giving someone a call tonight? Consider walking while you talk. “ Jon, you are on track to have a VERY ACTIVE day! Outstanding! We might as well call you LeBron James!” People who were on track to reach or surpass the 10,000-step mark received congratulatory messages such as The timing of texts was also customized to each patient’s wake, lunch and dinner time. The messages detailed a patient’s current activity “balance,” with the number of steps taken and number needed to reach the 10,000-steps-a-day goal. The other half received no such messages but could assess their daily report if they wanted to. Subdividing the latter group further, half of participants also received automated but personalized text messages bearing the names of their cardiologists three times a day. The remaining two-thirds of participants could freely view their daily activity levels, including total step count and aerobic activity levels on their smartphones. During the following two weeks, a third of the participants - the control group - had their activity levels tracked but could not view data showing how much they moved.
![november 11 2015 news november 11 2015 news](https://s3.studylib.net/store/data/005835502_1-7bc800fb479537fc00fdaf4ee3d9c7d0-768x994.png)
Using a relatively cheap activity tracker, researchers measured participants’ normal, or baseline, daily physical activity levels during week one.
November 11 2015 news trial#
The trial involved 48 men and women, ages 18 to 69, followed over a month at the preventive cardiology clinic at Johns Hopkins, all of whom reported low levels of physical activity to their physicians. To answer that question, investigators are conducting a long-term follow-up of participants involved in the original trial. Researchers caution that the study followed people only for a few short weeks, so it remains unclear whether the observed change in activity levels will persist over time. “Think of these messages as digital check-ins from your physician, gently but persistently reminding you to fit more exercise into your day,” says lead investigator Seth Martin, M.D., M.H.S., a preventive cardiologist and assistant professor of medicine at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Indeed, in their study of 48 individuals, those receiving text nudges were twice as likely to walk farther and reach a preset goal of 10,000 steps daily.
![november 11 2015 news november 11 2015 news](https://artlogic-res.cloudinary.com/w_1200,c_limit,f_auto,fl_lossy,q_auto/ws-otafinearts/usr/images/news/main_image/7/unnamed-2-thumb-800xauto-4415.jpg)
Instead, they report, personalized text messages that encourage people to go just a bit farther or congratulate them for having done so make the real difference. The idea that tracking physical activity can motivate people to get more of it is hardly novel, researchers say, but their study disputes the notion that awareness alone is enough to get or keep people moving.
![november 11 2015 news november 11 2015 news](https://kdl.kyvl.org/iiif/2/marion-news:47325/full/730,/0/default.jpg)
9 at the annual American Heart Association meeting, are also published simultaneously in the Journal of the American Heart Association. Linking digital activity trackers to smartphones and periodically pinging users with personalized texts that urge them to walk more can significantly increase physical activity levels and spark healthy behavior changes, according to findings of a pilot study conducted at Johns Hopkins. Personalized Text Messages Can Boost Physical Activity