by Bruce E. Beans

Living to 100 once seemed to be a dream. But today there are more than 55,000 American centenarians—and that number is expected to swell to 800,000 by 2050.

A growing body of research shows what it takes to celebrate your centennial, and to do so in good shape. It’s quite simple, yet quite hard for many of us: Use it or lose it, both in body and mind.

“We’ve already gotten the gift of 15 to 20 years of unexpected longevity, but so far we haven’t figured out what to do with it,” says Harry Lodge, M.D., coauthor of Younger Next Year: A Guide to Living Like 50 Until You’re 80 and Beyond. “Are you willing to do what you have to do in order to make those good years?”

You might be inclined to say yes once you consider a study in the Archives of Internal Medicine. Researchers from Harvard’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the VA Boston Healthcare System tracked 2,357 healthy male doctors with a mean age of 72 years for 25 years. In the absence of five key risk factors—smoking, diabetes, obesity, high blood pressure, and a sedentary lifestyle—the doctors had a 54 percent chance of marking their 90th birthday. Doctors with all five strikes against them had a 4 percent chance of reaching 90.

Such risk factors highlight the heart-brain connection, says Lynda Anderson, Ph.D., director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Healthy Aging Program. “Things that are good for maintaining your heart—not smoking, being physically active, and good nutrition—also are good for maintaining your brain.”

Exercise, in fact, is as important for your brain as it is for your body. “I tell my patients they can get two bangs for their buck. Exercising regularly clearly prevents heart disease, but it also seems to prevent cognitive decline and brain problems too,” says Thomas Perls, M.D., coauthor of Living to 100: Lessons in Living to Your Maximum Potential at Any Age.

Building strong emotional bridges to others is also vital, Dr. Lodge suggests. “Almost any mix of relationships, whether it is a single person such as your spouse or a broad network of friends and family connections, will help. It doesn’t matter if you join a stamp collecting club or work in a Calcutta orphanage, as long as it’s something you care about that brings you into meaningful contact with others.”

Education while young seems to help prepare your brain for the long haul. A 2008 study in the journal Alzheimer’s & Dementia found the rate of major thinking problems fell from 1993 to 2004. Researchers cite two factors: an increase in the average years of education from 11 to nearly 12 years, and the brain stimulation that results in adults during work and leisure.

“I think of it as Teflon coating for your brain,” says Kenneth M. Langa, M.D., Ph.D., lead author of that study and an associate professor of internal medicine at the University of Michigan. “It wires up your brain differently when you are reading, thinking about complex things, and interacting with people and ideas regularly. Th is increases your ‘cognitive reserve’ ”—neurons, synapses, and thinking skills that help your brain off set the effects of dementia.

Do you wonder if you even want to live to be 100? Reflect on this: Two-thirds of the more than 500 women and 200 men polled in the New England Centenarian Study reached 100 without much in the way of age-related ailments. They didn’t get sicker with age, says Dr. Perls, who led the study. “About 90 percent of centenarians are functionally independent into their 90s,” he says.

A third of the centenarians in the New England study came down with a long-term illness at least 15 years before they turned 100. The ailments included chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, diabetes, heart disease, high blood pressure, osteoporosis, or stroke. Still, most people in this group required little or no assistance.

William J. Hall, M.D., director of the Center for Healthy Aging at the University of Rochester, suggests a reason for their success. Perhaps their doctors aggressively treated their illnesses rather than writing off their patients as just getting old, he says. So if your doctor suggests steps to help you—statins to lower your cholesterol, for instance—take them.

As you weigh moves that may help, Dr. Perls advises, beware of quackery. He singles out human growth hormone and antiaging clinics as “solutions” to avoid.

Six Factors in Healthy A-G-E-I-N-G
Want to live well and long? Thomas Perls, M.D., director of the New England Centenarian study, says your chances depend on these A-G-E-I-N-G factors:

Attitude: “Centenarians tend to be optimistic and also funny and gregarious,” Dr. Perls says. “It’s not so much the amount of stress in your life but how you manage it that seems to be important. And these people have the kind of personalities that probably mean they can manage their stress very well.” People who internalize stressful situations are more prone to develop heart and circulation diseases such as high blood pressure, he adds.

Genetics: Dr. Perls’ study of 1,000 centenarians has shown that exceptional longevity runs in families. So if some of your relatives have lived to 100 or into their 90s, you may have a head start on longevity. But if that’s not true, you can still learn a lot from them. “Check out what led to their mortality and make sure you don’t do the same thing, such as smoking,” he says. “If their deaths were associated with diabetes, you need to be more careful about your diet and exercise to prevent that from happening.”

Exercise: You need to devote 30 minutes a day to exercise. You can break that into smaller pieces that total half an hour. Dr. Perls says it’s fine if your activity comes in the course of your job. Ideally, your heart should beat faster and you should sweat. From middle age onward, he emphasizes the importance of strength training to build up fat-burning muscle. Fat is related to many age-related diseases.

Interests: “Centenarians say what’s really important is having a cause that gets you up in the morning,” Dr. Perls notes. Take on new tasks that challenge your mind. “Once you get good at Sudoku puzzles, move on to something else, whether it be Scrabble, bridge, sculpture, or painting,” he says. “The key is to do something pretty difficult so you are exercising part of your brain that hasn’t been exercised before.” That may build resilience that can delay the onset or progress of memory problems.

Nutrition: If you are not staying at a healthy weight, Dr. Perls says, look at how healthy your diet is, cut back on calories, and exercise more.

Get rid of smoking: “If you smoke you can forget about any desire to lead a long, healthy life,” Dr. Perls warns.

To Learn More
To gauge your odds of reaching 100, Dr. Perls offers a free longevity calculator at www.livingto100.com.

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