Television-Related Disorders
Two television-related disorders reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association.Television Angina: Observed at a clinic for coronary diseases... This affected 20% of those patients with angina pectoris who watched television programs and was provoked by seeing violent incidents on the screen... commercials were innocuous, but Westerns and plays or films depicting violence or excitement often provoked anginal attacks. (JAMA, Apr 25, 1959)
Television Legs: Canada has discovered the syndrome of "TV legs," thereby demonstrating what should have been obvious, namely, that if a youngster habitually slumps in front of a TV screen for hours at a time, he will not end up as physically fit as his forefathers did. A physical fitness director in a thriving Toronto suburb surveyed 300 children in a day-long series of tests, and showed that 55% could not pass the minimum tests and 85% failed the maximum tests. The most common fault was a lack of flexibility in the legs and lower back, traceable to spending long hours sitting in front of TV sets... It is going to be difficult to find a set of controls who do not view TV and thus to assess the exact part played by this pastime in promoting ill-health. (JAMA, Apr 19, 1958)
Category: Exercise and Fitness, Health