By JACK KELLY, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Most children in day care don't get enough exercise, according to a study published earlier this month in Pediatrics, the journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Researchers, headed by Kristen Copeland of Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, found that children in day care spend only 2 to 3 percent of their time in vigorous physical activities.

Your legs hurt when you walk. Perhaps the best thing you can do to reduce the pain is to walk more, according to a recent study on claudication.

Claudication, from the Latin word meaning "to limp," is pain or cramping in the lower leg due to diminished blood flow. It's a symptom of peripheral artery disease, a hardening of the arteries due to the accumulation of cholesterol plaque.

Girls are more likely than boys to have headaches after suffering a traumatic brain injury, according to a new study.

A traumatic brain injury is any injury to the brain caused by a sudden blow to the head. A concussion is a brain injury that alters the way the brain functions.

Two men -- a 21-year-old student and a 40-year-old experienced triathlete -- died, apparently of cardiac arrest, while running the Philadelphia Marathon and Half Marathon Nov. 20. That same day in Pittsburgh, a local news anchor collapsed while training for a half marathon. She has a defibrillator now.

In October, a 35-year-old fireman died while running the Chicago Marathon.

Yoga can help improve the symptoms of lower back pain, but it does no better than regular stretching exercises, researchers in Seattle found.

If you want to keep your mind sharp as you age, make sure you exercise your body regularly.

Two recent studies provide strong evidence of a correlation between exercise and better cognitive function among seniors.

Endurance athletes -- in particular, those who are really pushing themselves -- often suffer cramping, diarrhea or some other form of gastrointestinal distress while working out or competing. Dr. Natalie Digate Muth of the American Council on Exercise, a physician and registered dietitian, has some tips on how to avoid it.

You go for long walks virtually every day and wear a pedometer to count the steps you take. Most days, you take the 10,000 steps the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says is necessary for an "active" lifestyle. You think you get enough exercise.

More than 600,000 Americans will suffer an eye injury while playing a sport this year, says the National Eye Institute. Of these, about 42,000 will be serious enough to require treatment in a hospital emergency room.

Children under the age of 14 will suffer more than 40 percent of reported eye injuries, according to the National Society to Prevent Blindness.

There's nothing like pain to motivate you, says Esther Gokhale, when she discusses what set her off on a life of research on aching backs and how to fix them.
"I had very serious back problems when I was pregnant with my first child. It was extremely painful. I was up every two hours at night."