What it's like to go through a Bupa Health Assessment and why the phrase 'off the charts' could be life-changing for me

After hearing - and seeing - it a Health Assessment in the new Bupa Clinic in Crawley - for me the phrase is now life changing. I was invited to have a full health assessment at the facility - which opened in June 2022 - and in the morning leading up to the appointment, I am not going to lie, I got quite nervous. Before I attended I had to fill in a questionnaire about my medical history, lifestyle, mental health and more. It was incredibly thorough but it was reassuring the Health Advisor and Doctor I met with seemed to have had a good read before I met with them and I felt they already knew me before I got there.

That has two benefits, one, you get straight into, and two, I instantly felt relaxed and was in safe hands. I went in knowing I am overweight, unfit and probably don;t have the best diet. I don’t smoke and I drink alcohol only every so often, so in that respect I kind of knew what the issues are. But I have never had a full body MOT and you never know what it might bring up.

The facility, still in its infancy, is everything you would expect, modern, clean and state-of-the-art. The welcome was lovely and straight away I was offered fruit and water before I met my health advisor Beth Mash. You will see in the video above Beth was informative, understanding and knew exactly what she was talking about - again all things that are reassuring when you finding out everything about your body.

First she explained what the process was going to be and the first hour was a lot of statistical testing. We started off with height, waist measurements and weight followed by blood pressure - something I have never had an issue with, but again, it’s been a while since I had one so good to get that confirmed. It was the first time I had blood pressure taken from both arms.

There was a slight difference between the two but overall, the blood pressure was fine. Phew!

Regarding height and waist measurements, this is where I heard the dreaded phrase ‘off the charts’. Each test I did during the assessment was shown on the computer with a traffic light system. Red = bad, Amber = ok needs improvement, Green = good.

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Overall I was a mixture of Green and Amber with one or two reds. In terms of Height to Waist ratio, this was where Beth informed me I was ‘off the charts’. I had a BMI of 39.9 which, according to the report, is ‘significantly higher than recommended’. The advice given is ‘There would be valuable benefits to your health from losing weight, these include not only reducing your risk of developing diabetes but also heart disease, strokes, and certain types of cancer. In the long term weight loss will also help the longevity of your joints’. Ok Bupa, I am on it now!

Next was the blood tests. I am lucky that I have never had a fear of needles so that didn’t bother me. I filled up three separate tubes (one of 4mm and two of 5mm) and these were whisked off to the lab - in the bloods they were testing for Diabetes and cholesterol among other things and this is where I was most concerned due to my diet. When Beth and the Dr Joannna Wallbank - more on her later - went through them with me and they highlighted my cholesterol was higher than it should be but risk of Diabetes wasn’t high currently. But if I don’t improve my lifestyle it could become a concern and a change in diet is needed.

It’s not like I eat takeaways and processed foods everyday, but I enjoy chocolate and I like meat - and a lot of it. So with a few tweaks that will certainly help that - along with exercise (again, more on that later) - I should be able to reduce that risk and further prolong my life.

After an ECG which involved a lot of stickers and wires - in fact I am still finding stickers I had not removed! - it was time to look at my flexibility. One of the reasons (apart from utter laziness) I rarely exercise is because I always seem to hurt something, whether it’s a knee or my back, it’s never easy to have a sustained programme of exercise. So Beth went through a full range of movement with me from neck all the way down to knees and ankles to see how I move. This is something I know I need to improve on and following the assessment I was sent a number of suggested exercises and routines I can do to help build mobility and strength.

Following all these tests, Beth passed me over into the extremely capable hands of Dr Wallbank. This was to go through the questionnaire I filled in and for Dr Wallbank to ask me any questions - we touched on mental health, sleep patterns and what we can do to improve them, family history, diet and exercise (again!) and also went through by blood text and ECG results.

Regarding diet, Dr Wallbank suggested the Mediterranean diet which involves eating more oliy fish and eating those good fats which will help lower cholesterol and help ward off the risk of diabetes. This was where I had a testicular check and a prostate exam - luckily nothing untoward here and my prostate was small and benign. This was arguably the most reassuring part of the assessment (don;t worry, that’s not in the video above).

The third and final section of the assessment was the exercise testing - this was split into two part. The Grip Test gave an indication of my muscle mass and strength - unsurprisingly (but also pleasingly) I was average for my age. Then I got on the bike for a predicted VO2 Max test which shows how well my body uses oxygen during exercise and what my cardiovascular fitness is like.Your VO2 max shows how much oxygen your muscles are capable of using during exercise. It depends on how well your heart, lungs and circulation work together to deliver oxygen to your

muscles.This is also called aerobic capacity. The higher the score the better your cardiovascular fitness and the lower your risk of heart disease and some other conditions. I fell not the red in this chart and my Cardiorespiratory fitness score (CRF) was 10 which classifies my fitness in the 10% percentile, compared to people my age and gender.

One of the more reassuring parts was how quickly it took me to recover from the bike test considering the lack of exercise I have had in recent days (or weeks, months, years!). Once the assessment was over, they quickly checked my ears for wax - the clinic provides earwax removal services - luckily mine were ‘clean as a whistle’ so no removal needed.

But on the evening after my assessment, I was sent my results - and this came with a lifestyle action plan and suggested exercises and tweaks to my lifestyle. It was 30 pages in total but every page told you something different about my lifestyle.

I went in knowing what issues were, the results show that there were no surprises or anything untoward, which is obviously great - but when you see phrases like ‘unplottable waist

to height ratio’ under the subject line of ‘Health Concern 1’ you know it’s time to do something. This Health Assessment was carried by experts in an impressive facility and I now have a clearer understanding of my body and what I need to do look after it. I know I now can’t carry on as I am and this assessment has given me the motivation to do something about it.

To find out more about what Bupa offers at the new clinic in Crawley, visit https://www.bupa.co.uk/health/health-assessments/our-centres/crawley