Anti-aging Tips: 7 Ways to Boost Your Health

We all know the drill: Eat all the right foods and get at least 30 minutes of aerobic exercise a day, and you’ll live to a ripe old age. So how come healthy 60-year-olds drop dead, while people with all sorts of serious maladies live well into their 80s and 90s? Apparently there’s more to “good health” than physical activity and good nutrition.

Here are seven unheralded ways to boost your health and your long-term survival rate.

• Maintain social and community ties. Numerous studies have linked social support to improved immune function, longevity, a lower risk of heart disease and speedier recovery from serious illness and surgery. In fact, a 1999 study in BMJ (the British Medical Journal) found that socially active individuals were just as healthy as their counterparts who exercised regularly, and that social engagement was more important than blood pressure and cholesterol levels in determining longevity. There is a catch, however: These connections need to be genuine. Casual acquaintances and cocktail party chatter are no substitutes for fast friends and abiding relationships. (Visit Revolution's Relationship & Life Balance Center for more information.)
  
• Get a pet. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report that having a pet can lower your blood pressure, decrease levels of cholesterol and triglycerides, and moderate feelings of loneliness. A 1999 study at the University of Buffalo showed that pets — in this case cats and dogs — reduced blood pressure and heart rate in a group of high-stress stockbrokers who were already diagnosed with hypertension. A study at Cambridge University in England found that the health of non-pet owners improved when they were given a cat or dog, with the highest level of improvement in the dog group (most likely from increased exercise). In 2006, researchers at the University of Cincinnati found that infants raised in households with two or more dogs were a third less likely to experience bouts of wheezing — a precursor to allergies later in childhood.
• Take a vacation. This may seem like a no-brainer, but a study published in 2005 in the Wisconsin Medical Journal found that women who took a vacation only once in two years had a higher risk of depression and stress than those who took two or more vacations a year. They were more likely to report lower marital satisfaction as well. And vacations are good for the heart — both for men and women. A study at The State University of New York (SUNY) at Oswego found that men who did not take regular vacations were more likely to die over a nine-year period than those who did, and that middle-aged women who do not take frequent vacations have eight times the risk of either having a heart attack or dying of heart disease. Conversely, women who take two or more vacations a year have half the risk of developing coronary heart disease or other serious heart problems.
• Volunteer. Giving back turns out to be an excellent way of getting back — at least when it comes to your health. In 2004, researchers at the Center for Aging and Health at The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore found that older adults who volunteered in troubled urban schools reported feeling stronger and healthier — and a 50% percent drop in the use of a cane. An earlier Canadian study found that volunteering can improve self-esteem, reduce heart rates and blood pressure, increase endorphin production and enhance the immune system. Need more incentive? Volunteering can improve your financial health as well — an English business survey found that 73% of employers would employ a candidate with volunteering experience over one without.
• Laugh out loud. In Anatomy of an Illness As Perceived by the Patient: Reflections on Healing and Regeneration (W.W. Norton & Company, 1979), famed magazine editor Norman Cousins wrote that 10 minutes of belly laughter bought him two hours of painless sleep. His 1976 article in The New England Journal of Medicine about his battle with ankylosing spondylitis ushered in the study of laughter and health. Subsequent research at Loma Linda University in California has shown that laughter increases the number and activity level of the body’s natural killer cells and reduces stress hormones that have been linked to heart disease. Studies presented to the American College of Cardiology in 2000 and 2005 found that laughter can protect against heart attack by increasing blood flow — it causes the lining of the blood vessels to expand. Other studies have shown that laughter boosts immune function and lowers blood pressure — although women seem to experience this latter benefit more than men. When not to laugh? After abdominal surgery or breaking a rib. (Learn more about laugher therapy.)
  
• Pray or meditate. Although scientific proof of the efficacy of prayer lags behind claims, a 2001 study in BMJ reports that saying the rosary (or repeating yoga mantras) may be good for the heart and synchronizes breathing with cardiovascular rhythms. Proponents of the health benefits of prayer say it improves coping mechanisms and produces better health outcomes. Perhaps that applies to individual prayer only — the 2006 Harvard Medical School Study of the Therapeutic Effects of Intercessory Prayer (STEP) could find no benefit from intercessory prayer in recovery from surgery. Numerous studies have reported multiple health benefits from meditation (particularly transcendental meditation) — among them stress reduction, improved recovery from surgery, lower blood pressure, improved pain management and a longer life span. (Learn more about prayer, spirituality and healing)
  
• Get — and stay — married. When Oscar Wilde quipped that divorce was made in heaven, he clearly hadn’t thought through the health consequences. In a study involving 127,000 adults between 1999 and 2002, the CDC found that married people were healthier than those who never married, are divorced or widowed, or live with a partner in “nearly every measure of health.” The Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., reports that happily married people live longer than singles. A 2006 study in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health drew a similar conclusion, adding that “having never been married was the strongest predictor of premature mortality.” The effect seems most profound for men. A Rand Corporation study says that 50-year-old divorced men can expect their health to deteriorate much faster than their married cohorts because they miss out on marriage’s moderating influence on such risky behavior as smoking, excessive drinking, drugs, and unsafe sex — and on its nurturing effect on diet, stress, and illness. But women clearly benefit as well: A Harvard University study found that married women were 20% less likely to die from a number of causes, including heart disease, suicide, and cirrhosis. The only negative? The CDC found that married folks weigh more, especially the men — three out of four of those ages 45 to 64 were overweight or obese. The slimmest? Those who never married.