Health Education

When patients with lupus erythematosus have active disease activity, they often feel tired and fatigued, mainly due to the inflammatory process in the body and the release of inflammatory related substances, which causes the patients to feel tired. At this point, patients should have a full rest. In addition to sleeping for 8 hours at night, they can take a nap at noon to supply their physical strength. However, too much rest will lead to muscle atrophy, muscle tone loss, which over time will make patients weak, often feel tired, and even cause mental depression. Therefore, patients should try to arrange rest and exercise in a balanced manner. After the condition is stable, they should start to do appropriate exercise as early as possible, because correct and sufficient exercise can make muscles strong, reduce osteoporosis, improve joint activation, promote blood circulation, enhance cardiopulmonary function, maintain the toughness of muscles and bones, and increase physical strength, which can be said to be of many benefits. Proper exercise should be encouraged as long as it is not harmful, colliding, strenuous, and exposed to excessive sunlight. Lupus patients are sensitive to sunlight, which is caused by ultraviolet B. They should try to avoid sunshine and avoid going out in the noon. They should go out with umbrellas, hats, sunglasses, or long-sleeved clothing, and apply sunscreen with an SPF greater than 15 thirty minutes before sun exposure. However, joints with inflammation are not suitable for movement. Before you start exercise, you should discuss with your doctor what exercise is suitable for you.

Physical fitness

Good physical fitness is beneficial for lupus patients. Physical fitness is defined as the body's ability to adapt to life, activities and the environment (e.g. temperature, weather change or viruses). People with better physical fitness have better vitality and adaptability when they are engaged in physical activities or sports in their daily life or work, and they will not easily feel tired or out of strength. Physical fitness includes cardiopulmonary fitness, muscular strength and muscular endurance, and flexibility.

Cardiorespiratory fitness

Cardiorespiratory fitness, also known as cardiorespiratory endurance, is the ability of an individual's lungs and heart to carry oxygen from the air and deliver it to tissue cells for use. Therefore, cardiopulmonary fitness can be an indicator of the aerobic capacity of an individual's heart, lungs, blood vessels, and tissue cells. Better cardiorespiratory fitness enables us to exercise for a longer period of time without getting tired quickly while allowing us to work longer and more efficiently. Through aerobic exercise, the best cardiopulmonary fitness and health can be maintained. In addition, the measurement of heart rate is closely related to exercise intensity. Through the response of heartbeats during exercise, we can understand the physical loading during exercise. To measure your heart rate, place your left index finger and middle finger on the radial artery of your right hand, measure the heart rate every 10 seconds, and then multiply this number by 6, that is the heart rate per minute. The more beats per minute, the more intense the exercise. Before engaging in aerobic exercise, it is necessary to warm up properly to improve the exercise effect and avoid the occurrence of sports injuries. During warm-up exercise, you can use flexibility exercise, jogging, walking and other activities, until the body is a little sweaty before starting your aerobic workout. After aerobic exercise, you should gradually reduce the amount of exercise through cool-down exercise, so as to eliminate the metabolic substances in the body, recover the body quickly, and avoid the discomfort after exercise. Cool-down exercise can be carried out by means of stretches and walking with lower intensity. Aerobic exercise is beneficial to the promotion of cardiopulmonary fitness. Any rhythmic, systemic, long-term and low-intensity exercise is an ideal aerobic exercise, such as walking, jogging, aerobic dancing, jumping rope, going up and down steps, swimming, cycling and other sports are conducive to the improvement of cardiopulmonary fitness. Do aerobics at least three to five days a week. The intensity of exercise is better with the 60-80% of the maximum heart rate, and being slightly out of breath but still able to talk is the basis of the intensity of exercise. In the appropriate intensity of exercise, a 20-to-50-minute workout can improve cardiopulmonary fitness. At the beginning of the exercise, you should take appropriate exercise according to your health and physical condition, and then gradually increase the time and intensity of exercise, but should avoid a large amount of exercise at a time, or excessive increase in exercise loading.

Muscular strength and endurance

Maintaining good muscular strength and endurance is of great help to promote health, prevent injuries and improve work efficiency. But patients with lupus erythematosus often have muscle and joint problems, so it is not suitable for muscle strength activities, priority should be given to muscular endurance exercise. When the muscular strength and endurance decline, the muscle itself is often not competent for daily activities and tense workload, and thus causes muscle fatigue and pain. Muscular strength refers to the force exerted by a muscle against certain resistance. Generally speaking, it means the maximum force produced by a muscle in a single contraction. Muscular endurance refers to the amount of time or repetitions when a muscle can exert force to maintain a certain strength.

Here's an example as shown in the figure below: high intensity is good for building muscular strength, while low intensity is good for building muscular endurance.

Flexibility

In terms of flexibility, patients who have been in bed too long or have stiff muscles caused by arthritis can do flexibility exercise at home or in free time at work.