Super Agers
An Evidence-Based Approach to Longevity
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3.9 • 11 Ratings
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
A New York Times Bestseller
Super Agers is a detailed guide to a revolution transforming human longevity. This is a breakthrough moment in the history of human health care. The person making that bold claim is one of the most respected medical researchers in the world, Eric Topol.
Dr. Topol’s unprecedented, evidenced-based guide is about how you and your family and friends can benefit from new treatments coming available at a faster rate than ever. From his unique position as a leader overseeing millions in research funding, Dr. Topol also explains the fundamental reasons—from semaglutides to AI—that we can be confident these breakthroughs will continue. Ninety-five percent of Americans over sixty have at least one chronic disease and almost as many have two. That is the essential problem this revolution is solving. He explains the power of the new approaches to the worst chronic killers—diabetes/obesity, heart disease, cancer, and neurodegeneration—and how treatments can begin long before middle age, and even long after. In thirty years, we will have five times as many people at least one hundred years old and they will be healthier than ever because of the breakthroughs Dr. Topol describes.
The amazing discoveries Topol brings into sharp focus are deeply inspiring about our human potential. We can now realistically see how we can make considerable headway for preventing age-related diseases and may one day be able to slow the body-wide aging process itself.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Topol (Deep Medicine), a molecular medicine professor at Scripps Research, presents an exhaustive and occasionally exhausting resource for understanding the factors that shape how people age. Delving into how certain lifestyle choices tax one's health over time, he cites research showing that eating ultra-processed foods increases risk of heart disease, that regular exercise decreases the likelihood of developing cancer, and that getting less than six hours of sleep per night raises one's chances of getting dementia by 30%. He explains the science behind dangerous chronic conditions, describing, for instance, how uncontrolled high blood pressure leads to the buildup of plaque inside arteries that can eventually result in a heart attack. "Stopping our bodies from attacking themselves" is crucial to achieving longevity, Topol argues, discussing how one University of Calgary researcher recently found a way to deactivate inflammatory antigens with iron oxide nanoparticles. Elsewhere, Topol examines how a decline in cells' ability to clear faulty proteins contributes to neurodegeneration, and how music has shown promise treating Parkinson's disease in elderly patients. The expansive collation of studies features the most up-to-date science on aging, but the dry presentation and technical language are a drag ("A discovery in inflammatory bowel disease of intraepithelial lymphocytes with specific T cell receptor antigens tied to loss of self-recognition is one path to developing immune tolerance"). It's a mixed bag.
