Can exercise determine your lifespan? If we all want to live longer and better, could it be interesting to know what factors contribute to us living longer? Much has been said about exercise, but… is it really one of those determining factors? Sonia Lucena, psychonutritionist, gives us some keys in this video.
“Although many people use the BMI or body mass index as a reference, it is not useful for predicting life expectancy. Muscle mass, however, is a reliable indicator. The Brazilian doctor Claudio Gil Araujo has reached this conclusion with a test that measures musculoskeletal fitness, which consists of sitting down and getting up crossing your legs without using support”, he explains.
Just a couple of seconds at home and you could predict the number of years you have left to live, according to Discover magazine. Araujo wondered if a patient’s flexibility, balance, and strength could be used as units of measure for her life expectancy; and it seems so…
This doctor followed some 2,000 people between the ages of 51 and 80 for an average of 3.6 years. “And he concluded that those who needed to use their hands and/or knees to get up and down were almost 7 times more likely to die in the next 6 years than those who did it without help,” says Sonia. A sedentary lifestyle and being overweight can lead to muscle atrophy, hence the importance of preventing sarcopenia and osteoporosis with strength exercises.
In this video you can see the test you have to do:
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