The longevity files: A strong grip? Push-ups? Here’s what actually can help you live to a ripe old age. – Bowling Green Daily News

So you want to live to a healthy old age. But how?

You could start doing push-ups. A study published in February found that men who can hammer out 40 push-ups in one session had a lower risk of heart attacks and cardiovascular disease compared with guys who could do only 10 or fewer.

Or you could practice going from sitting on the floor to standing. Another study concluded that how easily people over 50 can do that is a good predictor of how long they might live.

Perhaps you want to work on your grip strength. Thats another measure that tracks longevity in middle-aged folks.

And if none of those appeal to you, you could always try improving your walking speed, which researchers have used to predict mortality rates in older adults.

The problem with any of these approaches is that you would just be training for a particular test, which misses the point. Its not the push-up itself that makes you live longer; its that you are still strong and nimble enough to execute one.

What these tests have in common is theyre good shorthand of things that matter for longevity: overall health, fitness and muscle strength. A fit person walks faster than someone out of shape, and getting up off the floor is tricky for people with weak bones and muscles.

While researchers continue searching for a pill to extend life, youll have to try these verified methods.

The most powerful way to promote longevity and improve your long-term health is also simple and, depending on how you do it, free.

Theres no question that exercise is the biggest anti-aging medicine theres ever going to be its really huge, says Gordon Lithgow, chief academic officer at the California-based Buck Institute for Research on Aging.

Hands down, nothing compares to exercise, says Laura L. Carstensen, founding director of the Stanford Center on Longevity. The great thing is that most people can do it, and you dont need 10,000 steps per day to get the benefits. It takes remarkably little exercise to get longevity benefits.

Even 10 to 15 minutes per day provides measurable rewards, says Michael Joyner, a physician and human physiology researcher at the Mayo Clinic. Get enough sleep

Extend your life span while you sleep. It sounds like a bad infomercial, but it turns out that sleeping well is a good way to keep your body healthy for the long haul. Sleep is a time when your brain gets caught up on maintenance. In 2013, a team led by Maiken Nedergaard at the University of Rochester Medical Center published a study in Science concluding that sleep helps the brain clear out metabolic waste that accumulated during waking hours, providing a kind of restorative maintenance.

Skimp on sleep, and you hinder this important work.

Indeed, numerous studies have shown that sleep deprivation can decrease insulin sensitivity a measure of how well your body regulates blood sugar and increase your risk of diabetes. A 2015 meta-analysis found that Type 2 diabetes risk was higher in people who sleep less than seven hours or more than nine hours, compared with people who got seven to eight hours per night.

Forget all those headlines youve seen about anti-aging diets and anti-aging superfoods.

These notions are generally not supported by science, Lithgow says. Thats not to say diet isnt important, only that nutrition is just a very difficult science, he says.

Severely restricting calories in lab animals makes them live longer, but its not clear that it works in humans, Lithgow says. Although theres plenty of evidence that its not good to overeat, he says, whether drastically limiting food intake can extend life in people remains an open question. The joke, of course, is that calorie restriction will surely make your life seem longer.

The idea of red wine as a health elixir became popular in the 1980s with the observation that rates of coronary heart disease were low in France, despite the predominance of a diet relatively high in fat and cholesterol. The French penchant for a glass of red wine with dinner was proposed as an explanation for this French Paradox, popularizing the notion of red wine as heart helper.

Subsequent studies have indeed found that moderate alcohol consumption may reduce the risk of coronary heart disease, and a two-year randomized clinical trial in Israel showed that people with Type 2 diabetes who were assigned to drink a glass of red wine with dinner every night experienced some improvements in blood markers associated with cardiovascular disease risk.

But other studies suggest that alcohol may raise the risk of many cancers, and a report published last year in the journal Lancet concluded that theres no amount of alcohol that improves health.

In todays world, its easy to live in a state of chronic stress, and the problem isnt just that stress feels lousy. It also makes you more susceptible to diseases that could shorten your life.

Researchers are now learning that many conditions associated with older age such as cancer, heart attacks and Alzheimers disease share a common ingredient: inflammation.

Your chance of developing chronic inflammation rises with the passing years. Inflammation seems to be a general sign of aging, where our inflammatory processes are being turned on or accumulated, Lithgow says. Age-related inflammation is very much like inflammation from an injury, but now its coming on without a source of infection.

Forging connections with other people has been found to be a powerful way to manage stress and improve your overall well-being.

People who report having stronger relationships live longer than people who are socially isolated, Carstensen says. A meta-analysis published in 2015 calculated that loneliness and social isolation were associated with 29 percent and 26 percent increases in mortality risk, respectively, and living alone was linked to a 32 percent increase risk of dying.

Whats clear is that people who have a strong sense of purpose and meaning in their lives have a markedly lower risk of death than those who dont.

Centenarians tend to have a sense of purpose in their lives.

Its really important that people who are entering the later phases of life have a clear purpose, something to get up for every day, Lithgow says. That thing can be anything from looking after a grandchild or working or tending a garden.

Most of the proven tips for living a long, healthy life are not products that you buy, but good lifestyle habits that you adopt (or bad ones, such as smoking, that you either quit or never take up and is clearly associated with diminished longevity).

Even something as simple as always wearing a seat belt can reduce your chances of dying early. Most of the things that make up a longevity lifestyle are simple exercise, eat (and drink) healthily, sleep adequately, stay engaged if only people would do them.

To me, the bottom line is: Live a reasonably moderate life and youll be OK, Carstensen says.

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The longevity files: A strong grip? Push-ups? Here's what actually can help you live to a ripe old age. - Bowling Green Daily News