- Excerpt
RealAge: Are You as Young as You Can Be?
by Michael F. Roizen, M.D.
with Elizabeth Anne Stephenson
INTRODUCTION
The summary, below, is taken from the revolutionary new book, "RealAge:
Are You as Young as You Can Be?" by Dr. Michael F. Roizen. RealAge
is the culmination of years of research into the aging process. Dr.
Roizen and a team of scientists and computer programmers analyzed
the mortality rates in over 25,000 medical studies to determine how
our behavior affects the aging process.
The result is the RealAge Test -- a series of 125 questions about
our habits and traits that yields a unique RealAge for virtually
every user. We all know people who look and act younger than their
years. Oprah Winfrey took the test on a recent show, and learned
her RealAge was more than six years less than her calendar age. Dr.
Roizen is 53, but his RealAge is 38. If you were an average person,
your RealAge would be the same as your chronological age. But no
one is "average," so take the test for yourself and find
out.
You can take a short version of the RealAge test at RealAge.com,
where you'll also find a vast library of health-related information.
Or you can take the full version of the test in Dr. Roizen's book, "RealAge," arriving
in stores this week.
WHAT'S YOUR REALAGE?
by Michael F. Roizen, M.D.
How old are you? How old would you like
to be? What if I told you, you can get younger? And, what if I told
you it's not that hard to do?
RealAge is a brand new scientifically
valid system that calculates your rate of aging. People of the same
calendar age are very often different ages biologically. That is, some
of us age faster than others. Notably, simple behavioral choices make
a big difference in a person's rate of aging. Learn your RealAge. And
learn what's been shown scientifically that you can do to make yourself
younger. And it's easier than you thought
REALAGE: THE NET PRESENT VALUE OF HEALTH
CHOICES
Despite 30 years of advancement in our
knowledge about the relationship between health behavior and longevity,
preventive medicine has largely been a failure. Everyone knows things
that will help them live longer, healthier lives -- exercising, eating
a diet low in saturated fats, taking vitamins -- but few actually do
them. Fewer than 15% of Americans get adequate amounts of exercise,
even though more than 90% of those surveyed say that exercise is important
to health Why is there such disparity?
Because the goal seems too remote. It
is difficult to be motivated to take actions today that have a pay-off
30 years down the line. Who will take calcium at 30 thinking that there
won't be a benefit until age 80?
Enter RealAge. RealAge is a way of giving
a value to health choices in the present. By using the economic concept
of Net Present Value, RealAge is able to place a "years younger" value
on present day health choices. For example, exercising makes your RealAge
as much as 9 years younger. And, taking Vitamin C, D, E, Folate, B6
and Calcium regularly can make your RealAge as much as 6 years younger.
A CURRENCY FOR HEALTH
We all know behavioral choices that
are good for us, such as taking vitamins, lifting weights, and wearing
seatbelts. We all know behavioral choices that are bad for us, such
as smoking, eating too much, and not exercising. But, how are we to
compare these vastly different decisions? RealAge is a system which
converts the associated risk of all these behaviors into a single currency,
the rate of aging. Some choices make us older, and some choices make
us younger. RealAge shows just how much of a difference each choice
makes. Sure, we all know that flossing your teeth is good for us, but
did you know it can make more than a 6 year difference in your RealAge?
Or did you know that regularly wearing a seatbelt can make a difference
of as much as 3.4 years in your RealAge? RealAge provides a system
for valuing health choices. It gives you the information you need to
make informed decisions about your health behaviors.
By taking the RealAge test, you can
derive your own RealAge. The test, which can be accessed on-line or
in the book RealAge: Are You as Young as You Can Be?, asks questions
about more than 125 health-related factors. Then, from the answers
you provide, you derive a RealAge that is customized to you. Better
yet, you can develop an Age Reduction plan which will help you to slow
the pace of aging. You choose which Age Reduction strategies you want
to adopt, knowing just how much of difference each will make in your
rate of aging.
By reading the RealAge book, you learn
just why and how each behavior affects your rate of aging. Learn how
preventing arterial aging and immune system aging are the two most
important factors to help you stay young. Learn what you can do to
prevent the premature onset of cardiovascular disease and what you
can do to reduce your risk of cancer. The disease-paradigm so long
used by the medical community makes little sense when talking about
conditions that have to do with the breakdown of the body. Rather,
these conditions are signs of aging. By learning how different behaviors
affect your rate of aging, you have the information you need to begin
slowing -- and even reversing -- the rate of aging.
NOT IN THE GENES
Although it might sound like snake-oil-medicine,
age reduction is not a fantasy. Despite beliefs that longevity is largely
determined by genetics, this is not true. Approximately 30% of aging
is genetically determined. The other 70% is affected by environmental
causes and behavioral choices. That means, you can largely shape the
way in which you will age. The vast majority of us do not live as long
as our genes would allow. By choosing to "live younger," you
choose to live longer -- and healthier all along the way.
When you look at the rate of aging within
any age cohort, you see enormous variation between individuals. Some
people at 70 are sick and bedridden. Others are energetic, active,
and full of life. In fact, there is so much variation within any age
cohort that is virtually impossible to arrive at an "average" for
aging. The people who live younger -- those who live at "the top
of the curve" -- have behavioral choices in common: they exercise,
they eat a diet low in saturated fats; they remain socially involved;
and they do many of the 44 other Age Reduction strategies listed in
the RealAge book.
SCIENTIFICALLY VALID
In the book, we draw on more than 25,000
scientific studies, all of which have been peer-reviewed and appeared
in the most prestigious medical and scientific journals. Rather than
presenting new scientific data, RealAge provides a new way of interpreting
already well-established and respected clinical research, making it
both accessible and useful to a general audience. We present the most
up- to-date findings in every field, and do so in a way that is readily
accessible to everyone. That way we get the benefit of the best research
that the scientific community has to offer, and the readers of the
book get this research in a form that's easy to understand and easy
to incorporate into their own lives.
HOW WE CALCULATE THE NUMBERS
Virtually all clinical studies include
in their findings a calculation of "mortality risk." These
are well-accepted and routinely used calculations of "risk factor
probability." It is the standard way in which scientists extrapolate
from empirical clinical studies to estimate the risk of any health
behavior to the general public. These calculations estimate the 10-year
mortality probabilities of people who adopt any one behavior. For example,
a 50- year-old woman who smokes has a 10 year mortality risk of 0.88
-- that is, she has a 12% probability of dying in the next 10 years.
Likewise, a 58-year-old woman who doesn't smoke has a mortality risk
of 0.88 -- she also has a 12% probability of dying in the next 10 years.
These calculations, although the standard in medical research, are
largely impenetrable for someone not trained in statistics. A simpler,
and more accessible way to say the same thing is to say that the smoker
has the same RealAge as the non-smoker eight years her elder. That
is, the 50- year-old smoker has a RealAge of 58. The smoker and the
non-smoker have the same overall mortality risk. Just as economists
are able to translate risk probabilities into "net present value," the
RealAge calculations translate "mortality risk" into RealAge.
This mortality risk calculation is the best measure we have of the
underlying biological condition -- or rate of aging -- of a person's
body.
Better yet, RealAge is able to combine
multiple health risks into one overall number. RealAge has only become
possible with the advancement of computing technology. Previously,
scientists were only able to gauge the risk of any single behavior,
but were not able to estimate the mortality risk of multiple, interrelated
health behaviors. For example, many smokers also do not exercise or
eat healthy diets. Yet, it has been virtually impossible for researchers
to untangle the interrelationship between these behaviors.
RealAge is able to prorate the risk
of different factors, combining the risk calculations of multiple health
behaviors within a complex multivariable equation. Using the computing
powers of new high-powered computers and the latest in multivariable
statistical programming, the RealAge program is able to show how the
multiple health choices that any one individual makes interrelate to
affect that person's overall rate of aging. The result: one easy to
understand number, a person's RealAge.
IT'S EASIER THAN YOU THINK
Simple choices make a big difference
in the rate of aging. Choosing to take the right vitamins in the right
amounts, flossing your teeth, and wearing a seat belt every time you
get in a car are simple, easy choices that can make your RealAge 6-8
years younger. Reducing your blood pressure, becoming physically fit,
and losing weight are harder choices, but make a big difference in
your rate of aging.
The pay off of these choices is not
only in the future, the pay off is now. Choosing to live healthier
now means living younger now. You actually slow the pace of aging.
If you are 50, but have a RealAge of 42, you are living as young as
the average 42 year old. You have the added energy and youth.
You can live younger. And it's not that
hard to do.
Take the RealAge test and find out:
What's your RealAge?
TOP TEN WAYS TO REDUCE YOUR REALAGE:
1) Take your vitamins. Regularly taking
Vitamin C (400 mg/3 times a day), Vitamin E (400 IU a day), Calcium
(1000-1200 mg/day),Vitamin D (400 IU/day), Folate (400 mg), and Vitamin
B6 can make your RealAge 6 years younger!
2) Quit Smoking and avoid passive smoke.
Smoking makes your RealAge 8 years older.
3) Know your blood pressure. A person
with low blood pressure (ABOUT 115/75 mm Hg) is as much as 25 years
younger than a person with high blood pressure (OVER 160/90 mm HG).
4) Reduce Stress . In highly stressful
times, your RealAge can be as much as 32 years older than your calendar
age. By building strong social networks and adopting stress- reduction
strategies, you can reduce the aging that stress will cause by 30 of
those 32 years.
5) Floss your teeth. Keeping your teeth
and gums healthy can make your RealAge 6.4 years younger.
6) Do all three components of physical
activity. Exercising regularly is one of the best ways to reduce your
RealAge. By adopting a 3-tiered exercise plan that includes boosting
physical activity to 3500 Kcal a week, building stamina, and building
strength with just 30 min of resistance exercises a week can make your
RealAge as much as 9 years younger. Even a small amount of exercise
-- for example, two twenty minute walks a day -- can reduce your RealAge
by nearly 5 years.
7) Wear your seatbelt. Regularly wearing
a seatbelt can make your RealAge as much as 3.4 years younger.
8) Have sex. People who have healthy
sex lives within the context of a monogamous relationship are as much
as 1.6 years younger, and possibly as much as 8 years younger, than
people who have sex less frequently.
9) Patrol your own health. People who
are proactive about seeking high quality medical care and managing
chronic conditions can have a RealAge as much as 12 years younger than
their cohorts who don't.
10) Take the RealAge test and develop
your own Age Reduction plan. Over your lifetime, you can make your
RealAge as much as 26 years younger. That means that you will live
younger every day, and live longer with as much health and energy as
possible.
Copyright © 1999 by RealAge,
Inc. All Rights Reserved. Please feel free to duplicate or distribute
this file as long as the information included is not altered in any
way. Thank you.
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