Other reliable surveys combine factors of family history and your lifestyle to arrive at an estimate of longevity. This survey (below) may make you feel better if, like Richard’s and mine, your family history is not filled with 100-year feats of aging. It focuses on activities over which you have some control. When I applied for life and disability insurance, the agent asked me if I participated in high-risk activities such as piloting aircraft, scuba diving, sky diving, unprotected sex, or intravenous drug use. (more…)

Depression in late life is closely linked with senescence at a very basic level. Before discussing medical illness and disease processes, however, it will be helpful to review some more basic processes that may trigger, or at the very least exacerbate, depression through biochemical or neuroanatomical mechanisms. (more…)

The reduced physiological reserve after the one quoted above includes anatomical changes associated with aging, functional respiratory, urinary tract and gastrointestinal tract. In the case of the respiratory system is well established that the lung function deteriorates with increasing age. Some of the anatomical changes that contribute to loss of function include:

(a) Decline broncheolar average diameter, (more…)