Does Hydration Impact Aging?

The human body is roughly 60 percent water. This vital nutrient is a building block of every cell in the body. It helps to regulate our body temperature, transport nutrients and energy through the bloodstream, flush out waste products, act as a shock absorber for our brain and spinal cord, and lubricate our joints. [Read more…]

Connecting With Older Adults Is Good For You and Them

In modern society, most of us live in silos surrounded by people similar to us; this applies across many factors including race and ethnicity, socioeconomic status, and age. In fact, young people and even middle-aged adults today have less contact with older adults than ever before in human history. [Read more…]

Do Brain Games Help Prevent Dementia?

More than six million Americans suffer from Alzheimer’s disease or dementia, and that number continues to grow significantly as the U.S. population ages.

Researchers across the globe are trying to find ways to protect aging brains from dementia. Over the past decade, they have zeroed in on “brain training” — puzzles and games designed to improve cognitive skills — as one possible solution. [Read more…]

What We Know About Financial Decisions and the Aging Brain

As people age, some of their cognitive abilities naturally decline. In fact, some skills, such as working memory, peak at age 30 and then begin a gradual waning that is considered a normal part aging. In addition, about 10 percent of people 65 and older develop specific medical conditions that lead to cognitive impairment. [Read more…]

How You Think About Aging Can Affect How Long You Live

When you imagine an older person, what sort of picture pops into your head? Do you see someone walking stooped over a cane? Do you imagine them in a long-term care facility sitting in a wheelchair? Or do you imagine someone competing in a track meet, like the athletes who participated in last month’s National Senior Games track and field competition? [Read more…]

How Long-Term Partners Influence Each Other’s Health

Many people seek a silver bullet that will help them age gracefully and maintain wellness in their later years. A growing body of research suggests there is an overlooked element that helps determine health status later in life: the health and wellness of one’s long-term partner. Researchers are finding that as long-term couples age together, they develop biological similarities that affect their health in the long run. [Read more…]

How the Most Exceptional 100-Year-Olds Keep Their Minds Sharp

Nearly 15 percent of people age 70 and older experience some form of dementia; that number jumps to nearly 35 percent for people over age 90. And yet other people live more than 100 years with sharp minds.

What helps some people protect their brain health well into the later years of life? That’s the question researchers from the Netherlands asked in a new, longitudinal study published in JAMA Network Open that examines mentally sharp 100-year-olds. [Read more…]

What We Know About Exercise for Older Adults

People around the world are living longer than ever before, which has led to an increase in the overall age of the global population. Over the past 50 years, the number of people over age 65 has tripled. If this trend continues, older adults will make up more than 25 percent of the global population by 2050. [Read more…]

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