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Staying Healthy as you Age

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10 Top tips for Staying Healthy as you Age

 

Professor Desmond O’Neil


Professor Desmond O’Neil is a Consultant Physician in Geriatric Medicine and Professor in Medical Gerontology at Tallaght Hospital and Trinity College Dublin.

 

1. Embrace and welcome your own ageing: a negative disposition towards ageing is associated with worse outcomes in health.
 

2. Strive for social equity: social inequity harms health for all and, in particular, older people.
 

3. Start early, but it’s never too late: virtually all measures that improve health work at all stages of ageing, such as stopping smoking.
 

4. Invest in nurturing your marital/partnership relationship: stable, supportive marriage/partnership is associated with better health.
 

5. Volunteering and social engagement are easiest developed if started earlier in life.
 

6. Develop patterns of exercise, ideally a brisk 30-minute walk five times a week.
 

7. Consider activities such as dancing, which combine social engagemen
 

8. Develop a balanced diet.
 

9. Get your blood pressure checked in midlife.
 

10. Start attending your dentist regularly – oral health is associated with better health in later life.