Laura Czajkowski, an interpreter at Southeast Health and Dental Center, decided to join thousands of others in Indianapolis on May 18, 2012 and ride her bike to work!

Only she didn’t stop there.  She had such a positive experience that she has committed to riding her bike to work at least one day a week ever since.  I was able to meet with Laura and ask her a few questions about her experience with riding to work.

Here are the details!

What motivated you to participate in ‘Ride Your Bike to Work Day’?
At a couple of my previous jobs I have been able to ride to work and always enjoyed it.  I saw signs around town and heard the buzz going around about this year’s event. Then I saw that IU Health was promoting the event on Pulse and had a six-week cycling challenge to encourage employees to ride more.  I decided to give it a shot.

What made you decide to keep riding your bike to work?
‘Ride Your Bike to Work Day’ really inspired me.  I had a great experience and figured I could keep doing it at least once a week.

What are the benefits you’ve gained from doing so?
Saving gas money!  I live about 9 miles from work, which is an 18 mile round trip.  Even just one bike ride to work a week saves almost $20 a month in gas. 

I feel better and stronger.  I can tell I’m gaining strength in my lower body.  The first couple of times I rode to work, I felt really energized once I got here.  I would feel more tired by the end of the day, but that’s not the case anymore.  My body has adjusted and I just feel more energized overall when I ride in. Plus it’s easier to fit in a workout when it’s part of your commute.  I don’t have to worry about coming home and trying to get a workout in.

My coworkers have encouraged me to keep going.  They continuously support my riding goal by asking how I’m doing and some of them have either rode to work or are strongly considering it.

What are some of the barriers you’ve faced with riding to work?
Construction and weather are probably the two main barriers.  If the weather is bad I can’t risk riding, and there’s a lot of construction along my way to work.  Also, if I have meetings during work, or commitments before or after work, they may prevent me from riding.  That’s why I’ve only committed to at least one day a week.  I figure it’s not reasonable for me to ride everyday, but one day a week is reasonable and I have definitely seen benefits from just riding once a week.*

Riding a bike to work is certainly not feasible for everyone.  Barriers such as distance, time, improper equipment and lack of safe routes can understandably prevent many of us from participating.

But for some of us this can work.

If you’re even considering the possibility of riding your bike to work, I strongly encourage you to try it!  If you’re nervous to do it alone, talk to some coworkers and see if riding together would be possible.

Maybe you start slower.  If the commute to work is too long or intimidating, try riding your bike to run an errand or just taking a short bike trip in your neighborhood on the weekend.  Some is better than none.  As Laura mentioned above, even riding one day a week does make a difference!

Below are some great resources for more information about cycling in Indianapolis:
Central Indiana Bicycling Association
Indiana Bicycling Information
IndyCOG – Indianapolis Bicycle Advocacy

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Do you ride your bike to work?
Do you want to start?  What barriers have you come across?
Comment below!

• Apple slices with peanut butter
• Fruit with low-fat yogurt or cottage cheese
• Banana or grapes with low-fat or fat-free milk
• Smoothie with yogurt, fruit and ice cubes
• Dried fruits like raisins
• Applesauce or fruit cup
• 1 cup of vegetable or bean soup
• 1 cup of hot cereal – like oatmeal
• Small baked potato with salsa
• Hard-boiled eggs with whole grain crackers
• Nuts mixed with dried fruits
• Whole grain crackers with string cheese
• Chopped raw vegetables with low-fat dip
• Celery with peanut butter
• Whole grain cereal with low-fat milk
• Whole grain crackers with low-fat cheese or peanut butter

When should you grab a snack?

Snacking is good for everybody. Your body needs to refuel every 3-4 hours. Eat shortly after you wake up and between breakfast, lunch and dinner. Avoid late-night snacking.

The BEST thing about snacking!

When you pick low-fat, low-calorie options, you’ll boost energy and metabolism though out your entire day!

Here’s more food for thought.

For children living in poverty, we believe health should be a bridge, not a barrier to learning. HealthNet School-Based Services served more than 3,000 students last year with health care and health education services at eight public and charter schools throughout Marion County. With your help, we can do even more this coming school year to keep kids healthy!

What are your kids looking forward to this school year?

The final entry of our four-part blog series that has been full of introductions brings you an inside look at HealthNet’s Health Promotions!  A team that helps patients stay on the right track AFTER they leave the doctor’s office.
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Meet – Health Promotions

Community health centers are successful because of the fact that they are multi-service centers.  From a centralized location within a neighborhood, they offer family medicine, dental, podiatry, optometry, behavioral health, and much, much more.  Health promotions staff help to complete the wrap-around services provided by our community health centers.  The team includes a dietician, a smoking cessation counselor, prenatal educators, and a health education manager, but their reach goes beyond those areas.

Here are the four things you need to know about Health Promotions:

1. Health Promotions assisted more than 6,000 people in Indianapolis through community events, tobacco cessation and nutrition counseling, prenatal classes and patient outreach programs.
   What cannot be captured is the amount of people who learn life-changing lessons from the one-on-one counseling, classes, health screenings and numerous brochures, packets, and posters at community health fairs that help to drive home these lessons that our providers want our patients to understand.
2. Success stories from Health Promotions may seem simple to you and I, but the lessons are long-lasting with our patients.
   Learn from Delorus Alderman, a patient who quit smoking with the help of our Tobacco Cessation Counselor.  Or, read about our pilot walking programthat helps neighbors on the southeast side of Indy come together to support each other’s journey to become more fit.  These are only two of plenty of small but great successes by our patients who would not have had a chance without our Health Promo team.
3. Patient outreach programs bring back patients, patients who would normally skip appointments.
   It is really hard, most of the time, for our patients to (a) find a ride to our centers and (b) find the time to make it to an appointment.  It is a choice between saving money or saving health.  Our health promotions team along with health center staff do a GREAT job of getting patients to appointments.  They key in on certain incentives to make it a worthwhile trip.
4. You can be a part of promoting healthy lifestyle and be a part of HealthNet’s wrap-around care!
   
   • Promote our health education and other classes that are on the web!
   • Check our Facebook page for ongoing events and spread the word!
   • Small donations aimed at Health Promotions can be a BIG help!

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Want to learn more about what all goes on for Health Promotions?
Have a suggestion for great wrap-around care?
Comment below.

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