Effective Use of ACSM Guidelines and Integration of Professional Judgment
The American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) has published a number of helpful guides to assist practitioners with their many and varied tasks. One of these is the latest edition of its laudable exercise testing and prescription guidelines (4). In addition to the obvious guidance, these etiquette books offer a series of standards and indicators that can be used as yardsticks against which a practitioner can measure his or her performance as a health care professional. to know more : Avvatar Isorich
Achieving the most effective exercise testing and prescription involves a combination of a client’s fitness level and desired goals along with the best application of the available knowledge. The ACSM literature is rife with information about optimal performance and injury prevention strategies, but practitioners must apply this knowledge to create programs that are as safe and effective as possible.
Stratification
The ACSM guidelines are well suited to this task, particularly those that consider risk factors that are noninvasive, such as body fat percentage and body mass index. Nevertheless, practitioners must be aware that some clients are less than transparent about their personal health. This is especially true when the client is a sedentary type or has medical conditions that are difficult to quantify without the aid of a blood profile analysis.
The aforementioned guidelines have their place, but the most valuable lesson is that a practitioner must be prepared to integrate professional judgment into every decision made during an exercise evaluation or prescription session. This may include choosing an exercise test based on a simple pedometer or another self-reported activity measurement, determining which of the numerous tests to administer in order to find the best fit for the patient’s needs and abilities, and making sure that the resulting regimen is safe and effective.
