You're jogging at a steady pace, enjoying your favorite music through your headphones. Your breath is short and your heart is pumping. Your legs feel like they couldn't carry you any faster.

And then you hear the groan of a zombie over your right shoulder. It's sprint or be eaten.

The zombie apocalypse isn't upon you. You're just taking part in the latest fitness craze -- smartphone apps that make a fun and interactive game out of your daily workout.

Software developers are taking advantage of smartphones' advanced technology -- GPS, accelerometers, MP3 players -- to create "immersive" fitness games that appeal to both avid and reluctant exercisers.

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In 1972 President Richard Nixon traveled to the People’s Republic of China to initiate detente and successfully changed the course of the Cold War. In advance of this visit, American journalist James Reston also visited China and, while there, had appendicitis. His postoperative pain was successfully treated with acupuncture. The article he wrote for The New York Times describing his experience triggered another sea change, this one in health care. The American Holistic Medical Association was formed that decade. By 1990 the National Institutes of Health formed the Office of Complementary and Alternative Medicine, and in 1998 expanded funding to form the Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine.

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The state Hawaii Department of Health recently announced that it will begin to link deaths from prescription drugs to the physicians who prescribed them ("Doctors targeted amid rise in painkiller deaths," Star-Advertiser, May 5). This initiative is motivated by the growing number of deaths in Hawaii from overdoses of painkillers, mostly opiates.

Many of these deaths occur by accident when people mix opiates with other substances of potential abuse, especially alcohol. According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, prescription opioids killed more Americans than illicit drugs such as cocaine and heroin in 2011.

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Heart failure can take a heavy psychological toll, with many patients developing symptoms of depression. But a new study suggests that an exercise plan can ease the melancholy, creating improvements in mood that are comparable to the effects seen with medication.

For roughly a year, researchers followed more than 2,000 people treated for congestive heart failure at 82 medical centers in the United States, France and Canada. Those who were assigned to a moderate aerobic exercise program — about 90 to 120 minutes a week — saw greater reductions in symptoms of depression than those who were not enrolled in such a program.

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In recent years the mass market has seen a remarkable proliferation of services aimed at conditioning, weight loss and wellness. Curves is a streamlined women's fitness club franchise that popularized the 30-minute circuit training workout. CrossFit offers a strength and conditioning program with constantly varied, high-intensity, functional movement. Workouts are also typically short, lasting 20 minutes or less. CrossFit trainers can get certified in two days. Zumba is today's most prominent dance fitness program and has eclipsed Jazzercise, an earlier platform in this industry space. P90X is a home fitness and three-phase nutrition program designed to burn fat and build muscle.

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The first iPad came out just three years ago and further revolutionized mobile computing beyond expectations. It came on the market Jan. 27, 2010, and sold 500,000 units by the end of the first week. After Apple put a computer in the iPhone, who would have thought there would be room for another game-changer that lived in between the smartphone and the laptop?

Initially, only a few appreciated the difference. As it turned out, among those who appreciated it most were small children whose fingers were not yet coordinated enough to work a keyboard. Shortly afterward, touch-screen devices, especially for the young, flooded the market from companies including Nabi Kids, Vinci, VTech and LeapFrog.

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