5 Science-Backed Ways to Improve Your Health After Age 40
“Once you pass 40, everything just starts to fall apart.”
A family member told me that once, a long time ago. And as it turns out, they were half right.
While we age throughout our entire lives, the process does seem to accelerate after age 40.
During the latter decades of our lives, oxidative stress, cellular damage, and other factors can “accumulate” and create symptoms that range from fatigue to joint pain to heart disease.
This is what we refer to as aging.
5 Ways to Improve Your Health After 40
Now for the good news. There are certain things you can do to improve your health after age 40 — or to maintain the good health you already have.
They include all of the things you would expect (like regular exercise and a plant-heavy diet) and a few strategies you might not know about.
Along those lines, here are 5 science-backed ways to stay healthy after age 40 … or 50, or 60, or 70 and beyond.
1. Exercise beyond the minimum recommendations.
A massive study published in the journal Circulation showed that exercising for more than the standard recommendation could extend your lifespan and ward off cardiovascular disease.
This study tracked over 116,000 adults for up to 30 years. It found that people who consistently engaged in higher levels of physical activity (well above the recommended amounts) had a notably lower risk of death from all causes, including cardiovascular diseases.
Best of all, you don’t have to do it all at once. The key here is to find ways to get more movement and activity into your daily routine, throughout the day.
Take breaks at work to do some pushups. Go for a walk after dinner. Do a 12-minute HIIT workout in the morning.
Get it in whenever, wherever, and however you can.
2. Incorporate Strength Training
Use it or lose it.
Those five words sum up all of the clinical research conducted over the years that has studied muscle mass, bone density, and aging.
The short version is this: If you want to stay healthy and active over age 40, you’ve got to engage in some form of strength training.
Resistance training at least twice a week helps maintain muscle mass, bone density, and metabolic health, which are particularly important as you age.
According to the National Institute on Aging:
“Typically, muscle mass and strength increase steadily from birth and reach their peak at around 30 to 35 years of age. After that, muscle power and performance decline slowly and linearly at first, and then faster after age 65 for women and 70 for men.”
This report went on to explain that regular strength training can help people over 40 in many ways. It can maintain muscle mass, improve mobility, and add healthy years onto your life.
And we’re not talking about powerlifting here. Anything that challenges your muscles qualifies as “strength training.” So start slow and don’t overdo it. But by all means start.
Don’t have any equipment? Start with the classic bodyweight exercises, like squats, pushups, dips and crunches. You can always add on later, perhaps by purchasing some weights from a secondhand sporting goods store.
3. Eat plants on a daily basis.
There’s a quote I like in Michael Pollan’s 2009 book, In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto.
When explaining how we should eat to stay healthy as we age — and especially after 40 — Pollan cuts through the nutritional noise with seven words of wisdom:
“Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”
In a sense, the key to human nutrition, health, and longevity can be boiled down to a single sentence. Consume a wide variety of plants on a regular basis.
According to the American College of Lifestyle Medicine:
“Research indicates that a plant-based diet is the cornerstone of healthy longevity and potentially the most important prescriptive tool to help patients achieve a longer life and better quality of life as they age.”
Plants contain a variety of healthy compounds including vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, polyphenols, and more. Many of the trending supplements you hear about (like turmeric and resveratrol) come from plants.
And the best thing of all? They’re usually the cheapest thing in the grocery store.
At the very least, try to incorporate more leafy greens and berries into your diet. They’re loaded with antioxidants, which protect your cells from the damage caused by free radicals.
4. Make quality sleep a priority.
Getting seven to eight hours of quality sleep every night (or most nights) can support cognitive function, immune health, and overall well-being.
And according to several studies, it might also extend your lifespan.
A large study published in the peer-reviewed journal BMJ found that people who sleep for seven hours a night tend to live longer lives than those with longer sleep durations.
“A study of the sleep habits of more than one million people over six years seems to debunk the popular idea that eight hours of sleep nightly are required for optimal health. Those who had six or seven hours had a lower death rate than those who regularly slept eight or more hours…”
Other research shows that people who sleep fewer than seven hours tend to experience accelerated aging of their hearts and blood vessels.
Of course, there are times when you might need more sleep, like when you’re overcoming an illness like the flu or COVID. But other than that, seven to eight hours appears to be ideal for staying healthy after age 40.
5. Supplement selectively.
Certain well-studied supplements could also help you improve your health after 40. These include several different types of vitamins, quercetin, resveratrol, and more.
For starters, you might want to consider taking a high-quality multivitamin. Even a low-dose vitamin can deliver nutrients that you’re currently not getting enough of, despite your best efforts.
Multivitamins are usually packed with antioxidant powerhouses like vitamin C, vitamin E, selenium, and zinc (among other things). These and other antioxidants protect us from oxidative stress caused by free radicals, which is directly linked to aging.
Here are science-backed supplements that could help you stay healthy after 40:
- Resveratrol: From the journal Oxidative Medicine and Cellular Longevity: “Resveratrol could be an effective and safe compound for the prevention and treatment of aging and age-related diseases.”
- Omega-3: Yes, the stuff in fish oil. It protects our telomeres, which in turn protects our chromosomes and slows aging. According to the International Journal of Molecular Medicine: “omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) can reduce inflammation and decrease oxidative stress and thus, protect telomeres from attrition.”
- Ginkgo Biloba: In addition to being one of the oldest living tree species, Ginkgo Biloba also delivers a wide range of health benefits for humans. According to the journal Antioxidants: “it is possible to conclude that the use of GB [ginkgo biloba] can provide benefits in the prevention and treatment of aging-related conditions.” But ginkgo can also work like a blood thinner, so use caution.
Some other well-studied supplements worth looking into: NAD+, curcumin, fisetin, quercetin, and alpha-lipoic acid. You can get them through certain foods or in supplement form, but check with your doctor on the latter.
Supplementation is no substitute for a healthy diet or regular exercise. But it could add another layer onto your health regimen, giving you additional protections as you age.
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Disclaimer: This content is intended for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice. Consult with your healthcare provider before starting a new health regimen or taking a new supplement.
