Kaiser Permanente: Making Exercise a Vital Sign
Featuring: Dr. Jed Weissberg, Senior Vice President for Hospitals, Quality, and Care Delivery
Exercise is now a “vital sign” for all Kaiser Permanente members. While they have their weight, height and blood pressure measured before a doctor visit, patients are asked how often they exercise so that doctors can follow up.
“…The medical assistant asks the patient, ‘How many days a week do you exercise, and on those days, how many minutes do you exercise? So that is adding exercise to the set of vital signs, just like we added cigarette smoking as a vital sign so that it could be right up there at the top of the medical information for the doctor to engage in a discussion with the patient.”