New study shows what robs men of more than 20 years of life

In addition to genetic factors, lifestyle also affects the length of life. But how many years does each individual lose through unhealthy habits? An analysis provides information.

When it comes to lifestyle, nutrition and health care, women and men still differ significantly. This is also reflected in life expectancy, as a new study in the English-language journal “Age and Aging” confirms.

A few years ago, scientists from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) determined how great the harmful effects of an unhealthy lifestyle can actually be: People who heed all recommendations for health prevention live up to 17 years longer than their contemporaries with very unhealthy lifestyle habits .

However, according to the experts, biological aging does not only depend on these influenceable lifestyle factors. Socioeconomic factors also played a role, as did individual genetic makeup. This is reflected in a large number of blood biomarkers. “We wanted to know whether we can predict life expectancy even more precisely if we also determine suitable serum biomarkers,” said epidemiologist Rudolf Kaaks in a DKFZ press release.

Study by German researchers on life expectancy

For their analysis, the researchers were able to access data from more than 25,000 subjects from the Heidelberg EPIC study, which has been researching the connection between cancer, nutrition and lifestyle in a pan-European study for more than 20 years.

A closer look was taken at five blood values ​​per laboratory test, which indicate inflammation levels, oxidative stress, possible heart damage, kidney dysfunction and metabolic disorders and are therefore closely related to life expectancy.

A profile of lifestyle-related risk factors was also created for all study participants. This included:

Smoking,
body mass index,
hip circumference,
alcohol consumption,
physical activity,
diabetes and
High blood pressure.

Lifestyle costs men 20 years

“If the researchers took this profile into account alone, the life expectancy of men with the best profile was 16.8 years higher than that of study participants with the most unhealthy lifestyle habits. For women, this difference was only 9.87 years,” says the DKFZ.

If blood markers were taken into account in addition to lifestyle, there was a difference of 22.7 years between men with the most unfavorable values ​​compared to the most favorable group. For women, this difference was 14 years.

In short: The unhealthiest lifestyle in connection with the unfavorable blood values ​​in men statistically led to a life span that was almost 23 years shorter.

“Easy to understand reading” for health prevention

Aside from the fact that such study results can help to develop future prevention strategies, they could also have health educational value.

“Probable loss of life expectancy is a useful and easy-to-understand measure that physicians, for example, can use to motivate their patients to break unhealthy habits. It could also identify people with particularly high health risks who could benefit from direct interventions,” explained the study authors.