Compression of disability should be everyones health goal

What are you doing to maintain vigor as long as feasible?  Fries wrote a classic article in the NEJM – Aging, Natural Death and the Compression of Morbidity. Fries argues that chronic disease is our foe – avoiding chronic disease allows us to wait longer until we develop morbidity.  The ideal situation is excellent health until 90 then die in your sleep. How do we do that?  Unfortunately, some people develop chronic diseases that we do not know how to prevent.  However, any physician will tell you that much chronic disease develops because of lifestyle choices.  Here is my list of lifestyle choices that predispose to longer morbidity: Smoking – this one is a “no-brainer”.  Smoking has so many negative effects that we need a book to discuss the subject. Excess alcohol – modest alcohol probably helps, but too much alcohol can cause liver disease, heart failure, chronic pancreatitis and brain damage (and this list is probably incomplete) IV drugs – every time you inject a drug into your system you put yourself at risk for infection.  Obviously you can overdose and die right then. Increased waist circumference – I phrased it this way rather than BMI, because waist circumference is a more accurate measure of being overweight or obese Lack of movement – yes exercise delays much morbidity, thus we maintain vigor.  Exercise can help in decreasing the risk of increased waist circumference, but it probably has other very im...
Source: DB's Medical Rants - Category: Internal Medicine Authors: Tags: Medical Rants Source Type: blogs