- Certain dietary changes can extend life expectancy, a new study confirms.
- A diet rich in legumes and whole grains can add up to 1 decade to a person’s life if they start eating for longevity early enough.
- The study comes with a free, interactive online calculator that people can use to explore the life expectancy benefits that can be achieved by eating specific foods.
It may come as no surprise that the types of foods people eat can have a profound impact on their health.
Having a general idea of what to eat for health is one thing, but the sheer amount of information available can be overwhelming.
A new study, which comes with a free interactive online calculator Food4HealthyLife — makes it easier to estimate the beneficial effect of any food group on a person’s longevity. The investigation used comprehensive global data from the global burden of disease study.
Taking into account a person’s age and the proportion of the different food groups they consume, the calculator models the life expectancy benefit they can achieve.
The factors that influence a person’s life expectancy extend beyond diet, and the calculator only predicts the potential effect of dietary changes in isolation.
According to the lead author, Professor Lars Thore Fadnes from the University of Bergen in Norway:
“Research so far has shown health benefits associated with separate food groups or specific dietary patterns, but provides limited information on the health impact of other dietary changes. Our modeling methodology has closed this gap.”
The scientists conclude that a sustained switch from a typical Western diet to the optimal diet from the age of 20 could increase life expectancy by around 10.7 years for women and 13 years for men.
The study appears in PLOS Medicine.
The study and calculator present both an “optimal diet” and a “feasible diet.”
Today’s medical news asked Prof. Fadnes to explain:
“Since many would find it difficult to adhere to diet optimization that might require larger changes, we have also presented a feasible diet approach that is closer to typical diets and is also associated with substantial benefits.”
Dr. Marialaura Bonaccio of the IRCCS Istituto Neurologico Mediterraneo Neuromed in Italy said MNT“Actually, this distinction makes sense today.”
“The ultimate goal is progress, not perfection,” said Dr. Bonaccio, who was not involved in the study.
Cleveland Clinic dietitian kristin kirkpatrick, who was also not involved in the study, agrees. She said MNT:
“Someone who has spent most of their life consuming a typical American diet may need to take a more baby-step approach. For people who were trying to make changes early on, transitioning to more optimal changes [is] often easier.”
The younger a person begins eating for longevity, the greater the predicted increase in life expectancy. However, older adults can still extend their lives, albeit to a lesser degree, by changing their eating habits.
The authors write: “Switching from a typical diet to an optimized diet at age 60 would increase [life expectancy] by 8.0 […] years for women and 8.8 […] years for men, and 80-year-olds would gain 3.4 years”.
Kirkpatrick suggested several steps in the transition to a healthier diet.
First, he advised focusing on unprocessed foods that come from nature 85% of the time. “Next,” he said, “I would suggest starting to transition from animal to plant proteins, like eating a chickpea burger instead of a cheeseburger. You can even opt for fattier wild fish, like salmon.”
Ultimately, Kirkpatrick recommended switching to unsaturated oils, such as extra virgin olive oil.
“Eating more legumes, whole grains and nuts and eating less red meat and processed meat were estimated to be the most effective ways of increasing life expectancy for people on a typical diet,” Professor Fadnes said.
Dr. Bonaccio noted, “These are primarily confirmatory results and align with the vast majority of dietary guidelines and food-based educational programs around the world.”
One aspect of the study’s recommendations that may surprise some is the promotion of legumes and whole grains over fruits and vegetables to extend longevity. Prof. Fadnes explained to MNT:
“It may seem a bit surprising that the benefit of further increasing fruits and vegetables is probably less than the benefit of optimizing legumes and whole grains, but this is because most people have already ‘harvested’ some of the benefits of fruits and vegetables. vegetables by consuming more of these compared [with]for example, legumes and whole grains.”
Previous investigation It also makes clear that the benefit of healthy eating habits is greater if the person leads a physically active life.
“It is worth noting,” said Dr. Bonaccio, “that when we refer to the Mediterranean diet, which is one of the healthiest dietary models in the world, we should always consider that this is not just a shopping list. Rather, it reflects an integrated way of life: diet comes from the Greek word diaita, which means ‘lifestyle’. Obviously, that includes regular physical exercise, but also other types of ‘exercise’, such as mental, cultural and spiritual, which can have a favorable impact on longevity”.
Dr. Bonaccio would like future research to dig a little deeper into the role of processed foods in health and longevity:
“Increasing evidence in recent years supports the idea that a large portion of the diet from ultra-processed foods […] it is likely to be dangerous to health. […] So the point is: Is this Western diet unhealthy due to its low nutritional profile, or does it have something to do with its massive industrial processing? I feel like this question can potentially reveal unexpected results that can lead to a sea change in the nutrition paradigm.”
She also hopes future research will explore another question. she told MNT:
“It would be worth analyzing how modifiable risk factors contribute to increasing disease-free life expectancy”, which could be called healthy life expectancy vs. life expectancy. “If the extra years of life […] are spent in good or bad health is a crucial issue”, he concluded.
