Remember what your grandmother told you – “take a deep breath”? It might sound old fashioned, but it works. Breathing is one of a suite of tools at our fingertips as we travel through Omicron, according to our resident B:HIVE preventative medicine expert Dr Louise Schofield.
Put more scientifically, slow breathing allows the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain associated with rational thought to come back in charge instead of the more emotional amygdala; which processes emotions associated with fear.
Louise, whose PhD is in public health, co-founded PreKure® three and a half years ago with her husband Prof Grant Schofield and a group of nine academics and health professionals.
PreKure’s team of health coaches, mental health coaches, researchers, and cliniciansfocus on helping us to live longer, healthier lives without chronic disease.
PreKure is the third start up in the medical field that Louise has headed. The previous two were The Real Food Publishing Company (2015) and Vitality Works NZ (2010).
“They have all been in health and wellbeing,” says Louise, “because if you haven’t got your health nothing else matters. Little changes can make a massive difference.”
If you don’t see Louise around the B:HIVE as much these days, it is because she and Grant have relocated to the Coromandel. Louise travels to the B:HIVE a couple of days a week. The couple was worried how their previously active son Danny (12) was spending all day on a computer station during covid lockdown. School work? Maybe…
Now he is riding round town on his bike, swimming in the ocean, or building huts down the creek.
Louise is helping the family walk the PreKure talk.