Healthy Behaviors (especially exercise) Lead to Better Health

Recently, a 35 year study was published by Cardiff University researchers on the effects of healthy behaviors and quality of health in middle aged men. The healthy behaviors looked at included regular exercise, eating a healthy diet, not smoking, limiting alcohol intake, and maintaining a proper body weight. Of all these factors, the researchers noted that exercise was the most important factor to preventing diseases like dementia, diabetes, and stroke.

From the press release:  The size of reduction in the instance of disease owing to these simple healthy steps has really amazed us and is of enormous importance in an aging population,” said Principle Investigator Professor Peter Elwood from Cardiff University’s School of Medicine. “What the research shows is that following a healthy lifestyle confers surprisingly large benefits to health—healthy behaviors have a far more beneficial effect than any medical treatment or preventative procedure.”

“Taking up and following a healthy lifestyle is however the responsibility of the individual him or herself. Sadly, the evidence from this study shows that very few people follow a fully healthy lifestyle. Furthermore, our findings reveal that while the number of people who smoke has gone down since the study started, the number of people leading a fully healthy lifestyle has not changed,” he added.

One of my favorite sayings continues to be, “Health is a choice, not a chance.”

Reference:

Elwood P, Galante J, Pickering J, Palmer S, Bayer A, et al. (2013) Healthy Lifestyles Reduce the Incidence of Chronic Diseases and Dementia: Evidence from the Caerphilly Cohort Study. PLoS ONE 8(12): e81877. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0081877