Why Most People Fall Off a Health Cliff at Age 75 and 5 Ways to Avoid the Fall

Longevity expert Dr. Peter Attia says most people experience a sharp decline at age 70, but it doesn’t have to be that way.

“At age 75, both men and women fall off a cliff,” the Stanford-trained doctor, who runs a medical practice in Austin, Texas, said in a recent interview with “60 Minutes.”

During the interview, Attia shared some of his top strategies to not only live longer, but also to stay strong, healthy and engaged, to make the last decade as enjoyable and independent as possible.

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This is what experts call “health span”: the period of life in which one is free of “age-related diseases,” according to Dr. Douglas E. Vaughan, director of the Potocsnak Longevity Institute at Northwestern University in Chicago.

“There are certainly things that people can stop doing to prolong life expectancy,” he told News Digital. Some examples include quitting smoking, drinking less, maintaining a healthy weight, exercising regularly, avoiding processed foods, and having good sleep habits.

Below are the five strategies Attia shared with “60 Minutes.”

No. 1: Train as if life were a sport

Attia recommends approaching life, especially in later life, as an athlete would approach a sport.

As people age, their level of fitness, strength and mobility matters more than many traditional markers, he noted.

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The longevity expert said he gets about 10 hours of exercise per week: a combination of cardio to burn fat, high-intensity intervals (to increase VO₂ max), and strength training to maintain muscle.

Attia said he alternates between “zone two” exercise, which involves steady cardiovascular activity that allows him to carry on a conversation, and the higher-intensity “zone four” training.

#2: Use meaningful tests, not just standard blood tests

Attia recommends closely monitoring your VO₂ max, which measures the maximum amount of oxygen your body uses during strenuous exercise.

VO₂ max It is usually measured in milliliters of oxygen per kilogram of body weight per minute (ml/kg/min).

“Your VO2 max is more strongly correlated with your life expectancy than any other metric you can measure,” Attia said. “It predicts your risk of death from any cause, even more so than your blood pressure, cholesterol or smoking.”

“I think this is the neglected part of medical testing: how fit are you, how strong are you, how well do you move?” said. “And in many ways, these tests are even more predictive of how long you’re going to live than I could get from your blood tests.”

“Your VO2 max is more strongly correlated with your life expectancy than any other metric you can measure.”

Attia also uses scans such as DEXA (short for dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry), which measures bone density, muscle mass, and body fat.

“When you look at things like cardiorespiratory fitness, muscle mass and strength, they have a much stronger association than things like cholesterol and blood pressure,” he added.

Attia is also a proponent of full-body MRIs, which can detect cancers and other conditions earlier for better results, although he cautions about the possibility of false positives.

He also recommends getting tested for APOE, the gene that indicates an elevated risk for Alzheimer’s disease. Having one copy of the gene roughly doubles or triples the chance of developing common dementia, while two copies increase the risk 10-fold and reduce the average age of onset by five to 10 years, the data show.

#3: Eat more protein than standard guidelines suggest

Studies show that increasing protein intake has been linked to increased muscle mass and strength, stronger immune function, and reduced disease burden.

Attia recommends consuming more than double the protein recommended in current nutritional guidelines.

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The recommended daily allowance (RDA) for protein is 0.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight per day, which would be 55 grams for a 150-pound person or 73 grams for a 200-pound person.

No. 4: Prioritize emotional, mental and relational health

According to Attia, emotional and mental health is as important as physical health.

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“It’s as much a practice as what I do with exercise, blood tests and cancer screenings,” he said.

“By working hard on our physical health, we can slow the rate of deterioration,” Attia continued. “But if we are intentional and active in our emotional health, it can actually improve.”

The expert credits his wife of more than two decades for enabling his progress.

“Like the exercise data, I don’t think this is just a correlation,” Attia said in the interview. “I really think there’s also some causality that flows from the end of having good relationships to living a longer life.”

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Vaughan echoed that the common denominator of “super seniors” involves a supportive community, a healthy social environment and regular contact with people who care about each other.

No. 5: Optimize the ‘marginal decade’

While decline is inevitable, Attia said his goal is to make what he calls the “fringe decade” as enjoyable as possible.

“The marginal decade is not going anywhere. We will all have a last decade of life,” he said.

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“The way I explain it to my patients is that over the last 10 to 15 years, if you don’t do anything about it, you will drop to a level of about 50% of your full capacity, cognitively. [and] physically.”

News Digital has contacted Attia for comment.