It's been an exciting month for DISC Sports & Spine Center, as our expert surgeons have weighed in on a variety of health and wellness topics for stories in Forbes and Parade. DISC’s world-class specialists continue to be recognized as pioneers in their fields, offering expert commentary on key health topics. Adding to the excitement, the LA Business Journal recently featured the upcoming opening of our new state-of-the-art DISC Surgery Center in Tarzana.
Here are the recent DISC news features:
The 75 Hard Challenge is notoriously difficult to complete — just look at any one of the nearly 900,000 TikToks posted with its hashtag. Raj Desai, MD, double board-certified physician at DISC Surgery Center, told Forbes:
“The program requires its participants to complete specific daily tasks for 75 consecutive days without any cheat days or modifications. If you miss any tasks on any day, you must restart from day one.”
“Some benefits of 75 Hard can be positive habit formation, increased physical activity, improved hydration and improved self-discipline,” Dr. Desai told Forbes, as well as better eating habits. However, he told the news outlet that there are significant caveats to participating in 75 Hard. “The all-or-nothing approach can promote unhealthy expectations, excessive water intake may not be suitable for participants with kidney issues or cardiac dysfunction, and no rest days can lead to overuse injuries.”
As Dr. Desai points out, 75 Hard can build discipline and healthier habits, but the all-or-nothing approach isn’t right for everyone. Before starting any challenge, it’s important to listen to your body and choose a path that supports your health and long-term goals.
Joint pain is unpleasant at best, and can impact your mobility, sleep and quality of life at worst. A flare up indicates that the tissues within your joints have become aggravated.
“This usually results in the joint swelling, becoming warm and painful from both the inflammation, but also the associated swelling,” Dr. James B. Chen, MD, orthopedic surgeon at DISC Sports & Spine Center, told Parade.
“If you have mild to moderate arthritis of the knee and consistently perform repetitive, high-impact exercises, you may want to consider reducing the frequency of such activities in place for lower-impact exercises while adding in flexibility and stabilization exercises,” Dr. Chen said. Adding in days where you do lower-impact exercises can be a smart move to help reduce joint pain risks.
However, you also don’t want to avoid exercise completely.
“Exercise, especially as we age, is one of the most important things we can do to maintain and improve our overall health,” he said. “Not only will lack of exercise result in muscle loss around the joint, causing more joint pain from sub-optimal functionality, but it will also affect your cardiovascular and overall health.”
To find a long-term solution for joint paint, Dr. Chen told Parade that it depends on the reason for the pain. Medications, surgery and physical therapy might help, along with maintaining a healthy weight and avoiding repetitive impacts or prolonged joint strain.
The LA Business Journal recently featured the opening of the new DISC Surgery Center in Tarzana — a nearly 20,000-square foot, two-story medical building.
It will be the seventh surgery center in the network — other locations in the valley include Thousand Oaks and Valencia. This new ambulatory surgery center will feature 11 patient beds within five individual pre-operation rooms and six post-operation anesthesia recovery bays. It will also contain three operating suites with microscopes, imaging, navigation and robotic equipment.
Surgeons at the new location will be able to perform up to 1,300 spine surgeries and 400 robotic total joint replacements annually, in addition to general orthopedics and interventional pain management procedures.
Check out other times DISC's experts have been included in leading publications here.