University studies the relations to longevity for the people who are aged 90 years plus, a segment of the population that is growing fast.
Angela Dolan and Sue Nadel, aged 92 and 96 respectively, admit that they have no clue how they have managed to live for so long. Doctors and medical researchers whose aim was to study the longevity of the seniors joined them at Crystal Cove Park.
Dolan admits that he has no idea how he has been able to reach 90 plus. According to him, he had been smoking for a longtime and had had his share of drinking too. But apparently his dad lived long too – 83 years old- the maximum number of years lived in his family.
Nadel, on her part has been sticking to a vegetarian diet and practiced dancing until she retired – she was a Ziegfeld girl when she was in her teens and had danced on Broadway. Nadel stated that she had had a pretty active lifestyle. She however commented that the secrets of longevity remain still unveiled.
Nadel and Dolan form part of the UC Irvine’s study of the 90 plus. It is one of the biggest examinations concerned with the aging phenomenon in the world.
Since the year 2003, this study has followed the health of around 1,400 test subjects; each of them aged more than 90. The oldest living member of the study is aged 106 years old; however, the medical researchers have also worked with one subject who had lived up to 108 years.
There are around 15 participants of the study who visited the Crystal Cove State Park the recently to take part of the Crystal Cove Alliances’ Science and Nature that was organized at the Park program.
Harry Helling, the president of the Crystal Cove Alliance said that the program worked on various levels for them; it comprised of their efforts to bring the scientific research in the park and they are as a result, also attracting senior people who are not necessarily traditional visitors of the park.
Since 2003, the study has been able to discover links between the level of exercise done and longevity. It has also found that there exist higher death rates among senior people who are underweight. The study further showed that women were more at risk than men to develop dementia.
Doctor Claudia Kawas, who is overseeing the study at UC Irvine, says that people who are aged more than 90 years old are a rapidly growing segment of the general population, and researchers are keen to be able to learn more from these aging Americans.
On Friday, the seniors were asked to do simple chair walking and chair exercises in order to raise their heart rates. Once this was done, the medical researchers of Crystal Cove conducted numerous tests to measure the seniors’ blood pressure. The data collected from these tests will also be used to study if there are any connection between the Alzheimer’s disease and the blood oxygen levels.
As a group of nonagenarians assembled in one of the famous Crystal Cove cottages, one of the participants of the study asked Kawas why he found them phenomenal. The majority of the participants were teenagers when the cottage was built.
Kawas answered that there were not many people who lived so long as them and you were as healthy to be able to have such conversations about current affairs. These qualities are what render them so phenomenal.
Source: Dailypilot
Anti Aging, Gerontology, Health And Aging, Lifestyle, Longevity
Sun, Mar 7, 2010
Anti Aging, Gerontology, Health And Aging, Lifestyle, Longevity