Which of these five lifestyle habits are part of your daily routine? Seniors can add 12 to 14 years to their lives with these critical shifts in how they live.
In a 2018 study published in the American Heart Association journal Circulation researchers pinpointed five lifestyle factors that appear to be linked with a significantly longer lifespan, judging by the outcomes of two long-term studies that involved about 123,000 adults.
These are the same lifestyle habits that Rob and I have adhered to as we’ve grown older. Despite Rob’s chronic heart failure, my own poor family genetics, and numerous chronic conditions, we are still kicking. By that I mean that we’re not just “alive” but we’re energetic, athletic, and having a great time.
As we say in our book War on Aging, we don’t act anything like old people. That’s why we wrote our book to encourage other seniors to stand up and fight back.
These five factors aren’t expensive, you don’t need a prescription, they’re simple and easy, and everybody can adopt them. But because they’re so mundane and ordinary common sense, most people ignore them. They’d rather spend a fortune on supplements, spas, and surgeries to look and feel young.
Five Ways to a Longer Healthspan
Despite spending more on medical care, Americans have a shorter lifespan compared with other affluent countries. These higher rates of mortality prompted scientists to investigate the impact of health habits on life expectancy.
All five factors are things that you can control and change. In the 2018 studies, women who adopted all five factors enjoyed roughly 14 extra years of life, on average, compared with their peers who adopted none of them; men got an average of an extra 12.2 years.
The five lifestyle habits for longevity were:
- A healthy diet
- Maintaining a body mass index (BMI) of 18.5 to 24.9 kg/m²
- 30 minutes or more a day of moderate/vigorous physical activity
- Light alcohol intake
- Never smoking
What Is a Healthy Diet?
A growing body of research suggests that a meal plan focusing on vegetables, protein, and healthy fats has key benefits for losing weight, keeping the mind sharp, and protecting the heart and brain as you age. This study bolsters the research that finds healthy eating linked with living longer.
To calculate your BMI, read this previous post here. To understand more about how much exercise is good for seniors, read this post here. As for alcohol, Rob and I don’t drink any at all, so we are lacking this factor for longevity. But I’ve never heard of anyone dying from abstinence.
Real World Benefits for Healthy Seniors
Findings from this 2018 study parallel research from other countries like Japan, Germany and Canada. The scientists who led the study point out that “the United States healthcare system has focused primarily on drug discoveries and disease treatment rather than prevention.”
In 2018 an estimated 600,000 Americans dies of cancer. Heart disease mortality has declined, but still surpasses cancer. A record number of citizens are stricken with Alzheimer’s, though the prevalence of dementia has dropped in people who follow preventive behavior patterns such as the five healthy factors listed here.
So we’ll keep trudging the happy road to successful aging and probably end up the fittest in the cemetery! It’s what we choose to do. What about you?
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