Fitness Trackers: Which Metrics Matter Most?

On Health with Houston Methodist

Fitness trackers collect an impressive amount of data these days. But with endless metrics to sift through, it’s not always clear whether you’re meeting your health and fitness goals. Do steps matter most? Or are exercise minutes more important? What’s the difference between activity and exercise anyway? In today’s episode, we learn how to effectively use our fitness trackers and how the payoffs can benefit our health.

Hosts: Zach Moore, Katie McCallum (interviewer)

Expert: JJ Rodriguez, Clinical Exercise Physiologist

Notable topics covered:

• Whether someone who exercises routinely can still be too inactive
• JJ warns us about the effects of “the sitting disease”
• Where 10,000 steps a day came from (and whether that number really means anything)
• The health benefit of simply wearing a fitness tracker
• How to know if you’re getting enough exercise
• Tips for setting activity goals on your tracker that make sense for you
• The universal fitness tracker metrics JJ recommends we all keep our eye on
• Which fitness tracker metrics aren’t yet ready for primetime

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