BY LOREEN BERLIN: "Nifty after Fifty."
It's the name of wellness venues—not just a saying.
There are 38 locations in the U.S., with the one in Garden Grove at 12572 Valley View St.
Perhaps some, reading this, will remember recently seeing a short piece about Nifty after Fifty on a TV show and the remarkable results of "Seated volleyball," or, "No Fall Volleyball," which is available in the morning and afternoon at Nifty after Fifty, located inside the Encore Wellness Center.
BY LOREEN BERLIN: "Nifty after Fifty."
It's the name of wellness venues—not just a saying.
There are 38 locations in the U.S., with the one in Garden Grove at 12572 Valley View St.
Perhaps some, reading this, will remember recently seeing a short piece about Nifty after Fifty on a TV show and the remarkable results of "Seated volleyball," or, "No Fall Volleyball," which is available in the morning and afternoon at Nifty after Fifty, located inside the Encore Wellness Center.
Seniors say the volleyball game is really fun and improves hand/eye coordination, reaction time and core muscle activity without risk of injury.
Nifty after Fifty is a place for seniors of various ages to "Restart your energy and be physically active."
A progressive loss of mental and physical fitness are among the most important factors challenging seniors future independence and the loss happens ever so gradually that changes may not be noticed right away. However, it's said that much of the loss can be delayed, prevented and even reversed if noted soon enough.
At Nifty after Fifty centers, seniors can improve their endurance, balance, strength and mental acuity.
Certified personnel evaluate the overall condition of a senior's total physical condition and then customize an exercise program that's loaded onto a memory stick, with their name written on it — their own customized key — that is programmed with their evaluation, leading the individuals through their customized exercise program on each machine. Then, their progress is uploaded to in-house computers, logging their continual evolution.
Here's how Nifty after Fifty got started.
Dr. Sheldon Zinberg, an Internal Medicine doctor of gastroenterology (retiring after 35 years in private practice) and who also served as a clinical professor of medicine at UCI's College of Medicine and the Western University of Health Sciences, founded Nifty after Fifty.
Zinberg also founded the CareMore Medical Group and Encore Wellness Center.
In the 1960s, Zinberg said he started a large medical group, which had 18 different doctors in internal medicine specialties, and at the age of 59, he retired from his personal practice and went to work for the company he had founded.
"I noticed that HMOs were growing, but seemed to be denying care for people," said Zinberg. "That's when I decided to start my own program and put 'people before profit."
Zinberg told his medical colleagues, "If we don't make a profit, we'll just sell fish."
That's when he started CareMore, eventually developing his own insurance plan for seniors.
"As chairman of CareMore, I noticed seniors with hip fractures and other fractures from falls, so I decided to look for a solution to the problem," he said.
Taking seniors to fitness centers around the area, he designed a special program for each one of them. These individually customized programs dramatically decreased falls and fractures by 80 percent, compared to the CDCs numbers and those on the waiting list to start the program, he said.
The integrated and coordinated care model of CareMore encouraged JP Morgan and Crystal Cove to purchase CareMore from Zinberg and those with whom he had partnered.
Approximately four years later, CareMore was sold to Anthem Blue Cross as an even further improved model that Zinberg had started, putting patients first and coordinating and integrating care.
“That's what the new owners did, they made it a superior health care system," he said.
“In the beginning, no one understood that ‘Exercise is medicine,’ as stated by the American College of Sports Medicine, and they didn't understand the value of Nifty after Fifty’s customized programs.”
Now, everyone is beginning to get the idea and that it's actually the single-best medicine for seniors in terms of preventing and improving virtually every chronic disease, such as heart, vascular disease, diabetes and lung disease.
"The problem was, that I had a senior population so desperately in need of a customized program who couldn't afford personal trainers and so I had to devise a program where we could provide that together with clinical supervision in a safe and comfortable ambiance as opposed to a center with young muscular men in tank tops and beautiful women in tight leotards," Zinberg said.
"We customize each senior’s program through a thorough fitness evaluation that includes a health questionnaire, a balance evaluation, risk of falling, aerobic exercise capacity, strength testing of every major muscle group, RMR (resting metabolic rate), BMI, percent of body fat percent of lean muscle mass and many other items, Zinberg said. “Besides this, we further customize their program to accommodate the specific frailties associated with any chronic disease they might have."
Seniors attend Nifty after Fifty two-to-three times a week and are also provided with a home exercise program of lesser intensity to do on days they are not attending the Nifty after Fifty center.
"There are also group exercises at Nifty after Fifty that seniors can do to improve their balance, reaction-time and psychosocial involvement such as No Fall Volleyball, YogaLite, Zumba dancing, line dancing, Cane Fu (self defense and exercise training, using their walking canes), and many others," he said. "As we get older, we lose friends and being with others helps with depression."
For information, call 714-823-4400 or visit the corporate office at 12572 Valley View St. in Garden Grove.
