What is Workout Wednesdays, and how do I get my Residents/Clients started?

An Overview

This is an innovative solution that increases exercise for Senior Citizens.

We came up with a system crafted to appeal to senior citizens who aren’t already engaged in exercise regimens.  This system can really appeal to senior citizens of all abilities, and is designed in a way to allow them to increase their activity levels as much and often as they choose, as these are things that can be done in their current surroundings, without having to purchase specialized equipment or gear, modeled by people who they can relate to or look up to.

We crafted our system to address this root cause, which improves on existing components in a cohesive way, and thereby increases activity levels in senior citizens. We called it “Workout Wednesdays.”  Here is how it works:

1.  We identified 4 major muscle groups that would be most beneficial to senior citizens.
2. We researched exercises that would develop those muscle groups.
3. We translated these exercises into things that people of all abilities could do, at home, with common household items.
4. We then created a series of instructional media with certain parameters:
   1. Each video would come with a companion piece:  a one-page, printable pdf that explains each exercise, modeled after comic books or airplane seatback pocket cards, for clarity and ease of use. You can then save the handout for later reference, should you want to do the exercise later.
   2. A new set of this media would be released every Wednesday, as something that seniors can easily incorporate into their daily routine.

Our solution increases activity levels among senior citizens by making it accessible to seniors whether in assisted living or at home, appealing to a variety of abilities, easy to incorporate into a daily routine, and targeted in its health outcomes.

Each of the components of our system were created and refined based on feedback from geriatric doctors, nurses, senior living facility directors, telehealth providers, activity directors, and ultimately meetings with the professionals from an Innovation Lab.

How the website works

Every Wednesday a new “Week” is uploaded to this website. In these weekly programs, there is a checklist of the household items you will need to complete the exercise. There would then be the exercise video and instructional pamphlet below the list. At the very bottom of the page you will see a “Previous”, “Home”, and “Next” button. “Previous”, for the week before that’s exercise, “Home”, for the Home Landing Page of the website, and “Next”, for the next weeks video. However, if the next weeks exercise has not been uploaded yet, you will see a “Coming Soon” button.

How to Download/Print the exercise videos and handouts?

To save videos: In the lower right-hand corner of the video, next to the audio and screen enlarging button, there is a button with three dots. When you click on this, there should be two options, “Picture in picture” and “Download”. Click on the download button, and it will be saved to your files. You can do this to save a video for later, but we would also like to make note that you can show the video directly from our website.

For Handouts: Right-Click over the handout, and there should be a list of options that shows up. There are two recommended options. If you want to save the image, click “Save Image As”. If you would like to print the photo, click “Open Image In New Tab”. After going to the new tab with the image in it, go to the top right corner. Below the Red X button that closes your browser, there should be three dots, similar to the one with the videos. Among these options, click “Print”.