Advanced Biomarkers and longevity predictors: we can measure it!
By:
Dr. Anusha Khan,
Dr Sheri Kochendoerfer
How active do you see yourself as an 80 year old? What if you knew your risks of heart attack, stroke, diabetes or cognitive decline before these ailments actually surfaced? You could then take action right away to minimize the risk of actually developing these diseases for as long as possible. Breakthroughs in precision medicine allows us to be able to measure such biomarkers so that we can truly personalize our patients’ care and help stave off disease for as long as possible. That’s true preventative care! And it helps improve quality of life as we age so that when we are 80 or 90, our bodies are actually at the level of a functional 60 year old.
By patterning with Cleveland Heart Lab and George Mason University’s Sports Medicine Lab, we are able to conduct comprehensive assessments for our patients and help them optimize their health and improve their longevity!
In the USA, most chronic diseases that leave us frail and non-functional as we age, can be placed in the bucket of cardiovascular and metabolic disease processes. But what if you could know your risks so you can do something NOW to change the course of your trajectory? Advanced biomarkers that look for hidden cardiovascular and metabolic risks give you that head start! They are sort of like the “canary in the coal mine”. Heeding the warning and deploying course changing protocols can help you minimize risk of developing disease far earlier, giving you the best chance of living as long as possible in a functional and healthy state. Most routine labs done at primary care offices are designed only detect disease when it has already surfaced. Don’t get us wrong… these labs are vital, necessary and tremendously helpful in diagnosing conditions and we too use them all the time. But true prevention is catching disease BEFORE it has a chance to surface and cause damage. And that’s where having the capability of measuring advanced biomarkers gives patients a much better chance of improving their healthspan and longevity. Our partnership with Cleveland Heart Lab allows us access to this technology.
Another key predictor of longevity is one’s VO2max. Measuring this metric tells you a lot about your physical fitness. The better your VO2max, the more functional you are predicted to be as you approach the later decades of your life. Optimizing physical fitness now is a prerequisite of functionality in your 70s, 80s or 90s.
VO2max is tested via measuring how much oxygen your body is able to utilize while performing aerobic activity, such as running on a treadmill or cycling on a stationary bike. The sophisticated technology makes use of a mask that is placed on your face that is able to quantify oxygen being inhaled in and amount of carbon dioxide and oxygen being exhaled out, while performing aerobic activity to exhaustion. By knowing the amount of oxygen that exists in our environment (FiO2), and the amount of oxygen exhaled out (much smaller amount), we are able to compute the body’s utilization of oxygen, hence the VO2max. Improving your VO2max optimizes your cardiovascular fitness and longevity. Through our partnership with George Mason University's Sports Medicine Lab, we are able to assess our patient’s VO2max. We then place them on exercise protocols to help improve this metric, which has a tremendous impact on their longevity and healthspan.
Get started on optimizing your health today, for a better tomorrow. We are accepting new patients! You can get a stand-alone assessment or better yet, become a member and get a member-rate for your longevity assessment! As a member, you also get hassle-free timely primary care with direct access to your doctor.