A recent article I found is a good reminder of what it means to live a long and healthy life. I've paraphrased it here along with some of my own thoughts and experience. Enjoy!
More and more people are living to age 100. The average life expectancy at birth in the United States is about 76 years, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
But although we’re likely to live to an older age than our grandparents’ generation, that doesn’t mean we’re any healthier than they are.
“It’s between four and eight years that we live longer than our grandparents,” on average, says Greg Macpherson, cellular health expert and founder of SRW Laboratories, a biotechnology company.
“People are generally living longer, and we’re generally losing fewer people earlier. And those two things work together to increase our longevity”
Macpherson is also the author of the book “Harnessing the Nine Hallmarks of Aging.”
It turns out that our “health spans” just aren’t keeping up with our “lifespans”, Macpherson adds.
Lifespan is the number of years you live between birth and death, while health span is how long you’re living in good health without any issues.
“We’re living longer, but we’re kind of grinding our way through the last maybe 25% of our life with some form of health condition,” Macpherson says.
About 65% of people over the age of 60 are living with multiple health issues, he adds.
Here’s why our health span isn’t increasing at the same rate as our lifespan. Plus, seven ways you can help lengthen the healthiest years of your life.
The American healthcare system has a ‘break-fix model’
The biggest problem for our health spans is the reliance on medicine to fix health problems after they’ve already occurred, rather than prioritizing prevention.
Our healthcare system has “a break-fix model. Most Westerners believe when you get sick, you go to the doctor. Doctors today, for the most part, are practicing health crisis management medicine. Just a few hundred years ago this wasn't the case. People used to take a more active role in their health. This allowed doctors to practice preventative medicine. Unfortunately, that philosophy seems to have disappeared.
“But what people are realizing now is just like we take our cars to get service every six months, because if we don’t it’s dangerous and it can be really expensive, what we have to transition to is preventative healthcare.”
Lifespan is increasing because we have newer and more advanced technology and medicine than what was available when our grandparents were our age.
“If a quarter of the world’s population turns up in 2050 over the age of 60, and we’re all ailing, it’s going to be really expensive,” he says. “Hopefully things will change, but right now we don’t have the capacity to deal with it.”
7 ways to help extend the healthy years of your life
Here are a few practices Macpherson encourages to add more years to your health span.
1. Don’t skip catching up with your medical team. As we age it's important to create your own personal medical group. This means staying current with your primary care provider and other healthcare providers that provide you with the best care for your own personal needs.
2. Ditch sugar. “We cause our body a lot of problems when it has to deal with too much sugar, and it ages us and affects our health span,” he says. Unfortunately, most of us were raised with little to no education in basic nutrition. There are two nutritional models: western and eastern. Both are radically different from each other. Sugar provides a sweet flavor. Of the five basic flavors in Chinese medicine, the sweet flavor is one of two flavors that are the most overused and thus addictive. Though the sweet flavor has benefits the majority of people have a problem with knowing how much is too much. Overconsumption of the sweet flavor causes inflammation to accumulate in the gastrointestinal tract and eventually progresses to our limbs, joints, and nervous system.
3. Maintain a healthy diet. Stick to a Mediterranean diet or plant-based diet, with meat occasionally for extra protein. One book I tend to recommend to patients is "The China Study" by T. Colin Campbell. Following the guidelines in this book can be very helpful in restoring the body's natural born wellness.
4. Sit less: “Sitting is bad, standing is good,” so consider a standing desk while you work, he suggests. Research has linked sitting for long periods of time with a number of health concerns. They include obesity and a cluster of conditions: increased blood pressure, high blood sugar, excess body fat around the waist, and unhealthy cholesterol levels. These conditions together make up metabolic syndrome and increase the risk of heart disease, stroke, and type 2 diabetes
5. Exercise often. Walk every day if that’s all you can manage, but aim to exercise a minimum of 30 minutes a day. Movement is so important. In Chinese medicine, movement is necessary for health. When a person becomes unable to adequately move on a daily basis, the disease process begins. It really doesn't require an intense exercise routine. Just get up from the couch and move. Walk around the neighborhood or around the house. Do whatever it takes to get your heart pumping and your lungs breathing. If you need guidance with how much is enough schedule an appointment and we'll be able to make some solid recommendations for you.
6. Remember to hydrate. “Generally healthy people” should drink four to six glasses of water each day, according to Harvard Health Publishing. Consult your doctor if you aren’t sure how much water you should be drinking daily. A typical recommendation I make to my patients is to divide the body weight, in pounds, by two. This gives a good rule of thumb for the number of ounces of water to consume each day. This may sound like a lot of water but remember, all the cells in our body require a certain level of water for them to function properly. If we consume just 8 ounces less than our recommended amount of water we will derail our body's cells to produce sufficient energy for our daily activities and efficient elimination of toxins that accumulate in our cells. This creates a condition known as chronic fatigue syndrome. And once it has set in, it can be very challenging to reverse.
7. Practice gratitude and mindfulness. “Gratitude, mindfulness, and a great social circle, I think, can add years, if not a decade to your life,” says Macpherson. One of the things I've noticed over the last three years with my patients is how much their health has been affected by the effects of the pandemic. Things like isolation from friends, family, coworkers, clients, etc. caused a great deal of stress mentally, physically, and spiritually. One thing that's helped me is to remember that there is still a lot I have to be grateful for. I find if I focus more on what I have to be thankful for I think less about setbacks and challenges.
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