AGING BACKWARDS — Oh wow, can it be true???
By Dianne Park
Dr. Mark Hyman contends that we can turn back our aging clock – at any age! Quite a claim indeed! Dr. Hyman is a family physician, a ten-time #1New York Times bestselling author, and an internationally recognized leader, speaker, educator, and advocate in his field. He is the Head of Strategy and Innovation at the Cleveland Clinic for Functional Medicine. And Dr. Hyman specializes in preventing, slowing and reversing disease! He is committed to helping people “Die young as late as possible”!
Dr. Hyman defines our Life Span as “how many years you live”. (Sounds about right!) But he defines our Health Span as “how many years you live a healthy vibrant life”. His goal is to get our Health Span to equal our Life Span.
Look at disease rates in the US. Six in 10 people have 1 chronic disease, 4 in 10 people have more than 1, and in just a few more years, at this rate, 83 million people will have 3 or more chronic diseases — ALL of which are entirely preventable, according to Dr. Hyman and many others.
Traditional medicine certainly has its place and thank goodness the research and many-known results are there to turn to, but it does not have to play the only role in the direction of our health or lack thereof. Medicine is clearly known to treat disease, but functional medicine doctors are striving to work with science to create healthy well being and function in the body by optimizing the immune system, the gut microbiome, hormones, and the energy systems of the body along with the body’s detox systems.
Dr. George Papanicolaou, DO, IFMCP, a graduate of the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine and Board Certified in family Medicine from Abington Memorial Hospital, Abington, Pennsylvania is also an Institute for Functional Medicine Certified Practitioner. Along with Dr. Hyman, he claims that heart disease, diabetes, cancer, dementia, depression, osteoporosis, autoimmune diseases and lots more come on gradually and when the root cause of these diseases can be identified and addressed, then all the related systems in the body can work together to prevent these diseases.
Functional medicine is considered the medicine of the future and functional medicine doctors are convinced that “we need it now”! The key to successful healthy aging and health in general is to find all the underlying causes. Our health is one whole integrated, dynamic, interconnected system – not one to be treated separately by different specialist for different parts of the body. The key to this is treating the whole body system and removing the things that create imbalance and providing those things that restore balance and optimal function. And this can be done at any age or stage of disease. BUT the sooner you start, the better.
Dr. Elizabeth Boham MD, IFMCP, MS, RD, is Board Certified in Family Medicine from Albany Medical School and is an Institute for Functional Medicine Certified Practitioner. In her words, “All the systems in the body are integrated.” And she tells us to “Look at what’s going on underneath disease and dysfunction”.
So what makes us age quickly?
Dr. Hyman says:
“Your health status at this moment in time is determined by all of the inputs in your life:
Diet, Exercise, Quality of sleep, Stress, Nutritional status, Exposure to toxins and allergens, Microbes, Your relationships, Your beliefs, Your thoughts, The meaning and purpose you have in life — All of these things wash over your genes and determine your health status.
We can’t change our genes, but we can change how they are expressed. If someone has a predisposition to diabetes or dementia, that does not mean they are predestined to the disease. All of the above inputs affect gene expression for better or for worse. We have the power to influence all of it. It we get rid of things that impair health and we add in those things that create health, we can live a long healthy life.”
Dr. Todd LePine, graduated from Dartmouth Medical School and Board Certified in Internal medicine, specializing in Integrative Functional Medicine says the same things, just a bit differently. In Dr. LePine’s words, “Your DNA genes are not your destiny.” This is contrary to what a lot of us have been taught. Just because your parents had a certain disease does not mean that you are going to get that disease. Genes are a “recipe” for making protein and various chemicals in the body. Your genes are a bit like a loaded gun. You can have the genes that are predisposed toward inflammation or oxidative stress, but a loaded gun doesn’t kill anyone until you pull the trigger. And a person’s lifestyle and environment is the finger that pulls the trigger on your genes. You are not destined by your DNA.”
Dr. Hyman stresses that 90%, yes 90%!!! of our health status is a result of what we expose our genes to over our lifetime. Disease results from imbalances in the body’s basic functional and interconnected systems.
In Dr Hyman’s words, “The biggest killer in the world is heart disease but our traditional approach is pretty misguided and addresses the symptoms, not the causes. High blood pressure, high blood sugar, high cholesterol don’t just happen out of the blue. They are signs of imbalance, of underlying dysfunction that can be fixed.”
There is a relatively new field of doctors called immunologists and they are looking at why is there inflammation in the first place. If we can find the cause, we can literally unwind the effects of inflammation on aging, literally turn back the clock biologically.
Aside from our heart muscle, our most neglected organ is our gut. This is not just the colon and small intestine. It’s the incredible eco system that is living in us – the whole biome. It’s this incredible symbiotic relationship between us and our microbes that determine almost everything about our health. As we age, doctors often see a loss of gut function including leaky gut which happens for a number of reasons – “crappy diet” that’s low in fiber and high in starch, sugar and chemicals in processed food, drugs like anti-biotics, and acid blocking drugs. Reduce inflammation; replace leaky gut. Steroids should not be the solution to the problems caused by the way we eat.
A gut healthy life needs to include pre-biotics (it’s the fertilizer for the good bugs in your gut). Pre-biotic foods like onions, garlic, bananas, apples, oats, barley, asparagus, flaxseeds, cocoa, etc., normal and easy to eat foods, all feed the pro-biotics. Fermented foods like raw sauerkraut, kimchi and others are great food pro-biotic sources and some (not all) probiotic supplements are excellent.
Phytochemicals are the colorful nutrient dense components in the rainbow colored foods we should be eating to maintain a good gut microbiome. Foods like pomegranate, blueberries, strawberries, spinach, green leafy vegetables, etc. help build and maintain a healthy gut. Pay attention how to maintain a healthy gut and reduce inflammation in the body and watch our health conditions improve dramatically, across the board!
The KEY to successful aging and health in general is to find the underlying causes and then restore balance to the systems in the body. Restoring balance to the systems in the body will keep us healthy and younger longer. Wishing you both answers and solutions to aging backwards!
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Dianne Park is an ALL NATURAL health nut who loves to help others get and stay healthy and to offer people natural health solutions. She is also a spirited motorcyclist, nature lover and bird watcher, loves yoga and working out, is focused on self growth and loves to read both fiction and non-fiction. She has high energy and tries to always look at the positive.
