If you or a loved one has diabetes, you may have seen or heard of a technology called continuous glucose monitors, or CGMs. They are a significant technological advancement designed to assist individuals with diabetes in managing their blood sugar levels more effectively.
Being agile in your 60s and beyond isn’t about the ability to rapidly change direction while running or doing zig-zag lateral side-skipping. It’s about being flexible and coordinated with nimble enough reaction times to regain your footing when you trip, maneuver a full shopping cart around a busy store, maintain good balance or avoid bone-breaking falls.
It’s never too late to focus on what it means to be mobile, which is what agility comes down to. If you maintain your agility, you’ll retain balance, flexibility and strength despite natural aging.
Whether you’re a runner, golfer, Pilates aficionado or pickleball player – or a dedicated couch potato — your 40s are primetime for focusing on agility.
Why is 40 important? That’s because strength and muscle mass begin to decline when we hit our 40s. And if we do nothing, they can decline by 1 to 2 percent every year for lean muscle mass and up to 5 percent for strength.
Keith Richards once described getting old as “fascinating.” “The older you get, the older you want to get.”
Richards, who recently turned 80, may be fascinated, but many of the rest of us are worried about aging and the challenges that come with it. In fact, two-thirds of Americans, responding to a recent MDVIP/IPSOS survey, said they’re concerned about Alzheimer’s disease and dementia.
If you’re struggling to get a good night’s sleep, chances are you’re stressed. Stress is another public health issue plaguing America. In fact, more than 25% of American adults reporting being so stressed that they can’t function, according to a poll conducted by the American Psychological Association.
It’s not news that heart disease has been the leading cause of death in the U.S. for more than a century. And despite public health efforts to lower heart disease rates in the U.S., it continues to lead in mortality causes. In fact, within the next 30 years, heart disease and stroke rates will rise high enough to affect at least 60% of American adults, according to two presidential advisories published in Circulation, the flagship journal of the American Heart Association.
Processed foods can be a double-edge sword. On one hand, they’re easy, convenient time savers. But they are often made with questionable ingredients, from high fructose corn syrup, excessive salt and added sugars.
In 1942, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals introduced the first hormone replacement therapy (HRT) for women going through menopause. Over the intervening decades, doctors have gone back and forth on the safety and efficacy of using HRT to treat symptoms like hot flashes and vaginal discomfort.
Many of us take active measures to control our exposure to germs. This includes carrying hand sanitizer, cleaning public spaces with antiseptic wipes and stocking our homes with antibacterial soap.
Ten years ago, the World War ll-era British motivational catchphrase, “Keep Calm and Carry On,” reemerged as a worldwide meme. And for good reason. We’re always dealing with a regional, national or global crisis, be it a weather-related catastrophe, war, economic decline or a pandemic. Even so, the stress level of these remote crises pale in comparison to that of personal challenges like illness, death of a loved one, divorce and financial woes.
In a world plagued with chaos, how do you keep calm and carry on?