A new study, whose findings are published in the British Medical Journal, emphasizes five lifestyle factors that can significantly decrease the chances of developing a life-threatening condition as well as cut down the risk of premature death.
More precisely, the researchers observed the effects of regular exercise, moderate alcohol intake, controlled diet, healthy weight and no smoking on the health.
Previously, research has shown that the benefits of following each of the mentioned factors separately. Individuals in clinical trials who have managed to perform even one of the five factors have been able to maintain and even improve their health to a big extent. The results also remain the same in people who had chronic health conditions.
On the other hand, studies have also explored that people who tend to smoke on a regular basis or follow a sedentary lifestyle with little to no exercise and a poor diet have a far higher risk of developing serious health issues with life-long effects. For instance, the current global pandemic of obesity is directly associated with bad diets and lack of physical activity.
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People who experience the problem of obesity have also been seen to be smokers and heavy drinkers. In such cases, most of the people also develop further connected health complications such as diabetes type 2, cardiovascular disease, cancer, and hypertension.
This is why health professionals always recommend switching to healthier lifestyles along with the treatment as soon as one of the mentioned conditions is diagnosed or just to follow the suggested lifestyle in order to prevent the problems overall as studies have accentuated that having one of the health condition is responsible for sixty percent of the premature death cases.
Since the impact of each lifestyle change has been looked at individually, the researchers in the new study analyze the result of following all the aforementioned habits on health. To do so, they took data from the Nurses’ Health Study, which provided them with data of 73,196 female nurses. Secondly, they also sourced data from the Health Professionals Follow-up Study, which provided them with data of 38,366 male medical professionals.
After collecting data, the researchers moved to the next step of assessing the participants’ lifestyle and rating it from zero to five based on five factors including staying away from smoking, consuming a moderate amount of alcohol, exercising, maintaining a healthy weight, and having a balanced diet.
During the study period, the participants’ medical history, race, current health status, ethnicity, gender, age, and socio-economic class were observed. After the assessment, the researchers found that women and men over the age of fifty who did not follow the five factors had a higher risk for developing cancer or heart disease or diabetes.
On the other hand, the women and men who followed five or four of the lifestyle factors had a comparatively lower risk of developing these health conditions and had a longer lifespan in general.
The researchers believe that controlling these lifestyle factors can be a fundamental step in controlling the current life-threatening health conditions.
